Afternoon of the Pawnbrokers
February 10, 2020 9:36 AM Subscribe
Home again in post-crash, subprime Indiana. "There is no cultural divide between the coastal financial elite and the petty usurers in flyover states; there is only the capitalism of small differences, the scalability of exploitation. The operations are the same." (SL The Baffler by Jonathon Sturgeon)
I don't think I've ever read a piece so utterly dripping, saturated, and overflowing with contempt for every subject in it
Sounds like you're not a long-time subscriber to The Baffler :-)
posted by Harvey Kilobit at 10:32 AM on February 10, 2020 [13 favorites]
Sounds like you're not a long-time subscriber to The Baffler :-)
posted by Harvey Kilobit at 10:32 AM on February 10, 2020 [13 favorites]
Yeah the writing is extremely lurid and telling of the author's opinion of themselves
posted by Ferreous at 10:35 AM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by Ferreous at 10:35 AM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
I didn't have high hopes for this piece with "usurer" being up front and center. It's my understanding that the word is often employed as an anti-Semitic dogwhistle. Is the author not aware of this? Does he not care? Did he intend it that way? And what about the editor?
posted by treepour at 11:13 AM on February 10, 2020
posted by treepour at 11:13 AM on February 10, 2020
And what about the editor?
"Jonathon Sturgeon is editor in chief of The Baffler."
Oh, great.
posted by the_blizz at 11:25 AM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
"Jonathon Sturgeon is editor in chief of The Baffler."
Oh, great.
posted by the_blizz at 11:25 AM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
I don't think I've ever read a piece so utterly dripping, saturated, and overflowing with contempt for every subject in it.
Fair enough. But as someone who's never actually had any contact with a pawn shop I found the discussion of their biz model pretty interesting.
posted by Dean358 at 11:47 AM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
Fair enough. But as someone who's never actually had any contact with a pawn shop I found the discussion of their biz model pretty interesting.
posted by Dean358 at 11:47 AM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
Describing contempt isn't the same as expressing it.
posted by lefty lucky cat at 11:57 AM on February 10, 2020
posted by lefty lucky cat at 11:57 AM on February 10, 2020
Related: We tried to pawn some precious things and here's what we learned (NY Times illustrated column)
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 12:13 PM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 12:13 PM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
I don't think I've ever read a piece so utterly dripping, saturated, and overflowing with contempt for every subject in it
The piece read more like depthless pity for the exploited and more seething rage at those exploiting them.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:13 PM on February 10, 2020 [20 favorites]
The piece read more like depthless pity for the exploited and more seething rage at those exploiting them.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:13 PM on February 10, 2020 [20 favorites]
My roommate is a pawnbroker, and my spouse and another close friend are former pawnbrokers. The friend, K, used to manage the shop; my spouse and roommate used to work for her. If the chain didn't insist on understaffing its chain, running the shop on overtime out the wazoo, and refusing to hire anyone at all until the situation was truly desperate, they'd probably be still there.
Regarding the prose: yeah, turgid and self-satisfied sounds about right. The inventory doesn't look anything like the inventory at the shop I know best. Power tools, yes, but they're always clean. Cheap-ass DVDs, sure. Occasionally a pool cue, but it had better be the expensive kind. Electronics, those sell well, as long as they're certainly working. Musical instruments sometimes, but mostly guitars. Old microwaves? Taxidermied deer heads? Old dolls? They'd politely laugh at you and point you at the dumpster out back.
It's a pawnshop, not a damn junk shop. A well run pawnshop only takes in items that can be easily and reliably resold at a mark-up. That's how they do business. That means that if people bring in dirty tools, you point out to them that you'll have to clean them and you dicker them down on the price, and you clean what you've got. If people bring in nasty old microwaves, well, having those around might drive customers away from the stuff that's worth buying. Everything needs to be as resellable as possible, as fast as possible.
posted by sciatrix at 12:20 PM on February 10, 2020 [34 favorites]
Regarding the prose: yeah, turgid and self-satisfied sounds about right. The inventory doesn't look anything like the inventory at the shop I know best. Power tools, yes, but they're always clean. Cheap-ass DVDs, sure. Occasionally a pool cue, but it had better be the expensive kind. Electronics, those sell well, as long as they're certainly working. Musical instruments sometimes, but mostly guitars. Old microwaves? Taxidermied deer heads? Old dolls? They'd politely laugh at you and point you at the dumpster out back.
It's a pawnshop, not a damn junk shop. A well run pawnshop only takes in items that can be easily and reliably resold at a mark-up. That's how they do business. That means that if people bring in dirty tools, you point out to them that you'll have to clean them and you dicker them down on the price, and you clean what you've got. If people bring in nasty old microwaves, well, having those around might drive customers away from the stuff that's worth buying. Everything needs to be as resellable as possible, as fast as possible.
posted by sciatrix at 12:20 PM on February 10, 2020 [34 favorites]
That NYT link looks much more accurate to my friends' experiences, fwiw. And yeah, look, name brand jewelry is a goddamn scam. Holds no value at all. A pawnbroker doesn't give a wet shit what you paid for the stuff you bring in when it was new; they care what they can resell it for down the line. Some brands hold onto value, some don't, but jewelry pretty much never holds any cachet down the line for anything beyond its material value, and when you buy it new from the big companies it's invariably really, really overpriced. Designer purses actually work much better for delivering long-term value beyond the worth of materials.
Also, pawnbrokers get really good at quickly appraising items and working out what is real gold and what isn't.
posted by sciatrix at 12:24 PM on February 10, 2020 [7 favorites]
Also, pawnbrokers get really good at quickly appraising items and working out what is real gold and what isn't.
posted by sciatrix at 12:24 PM on February 10, 2020 [7 favorites]
So the author is contemptuous. Honestly, so what?
The obvious heart of the piece is the pullquote above the fold: wherever you go, the game is the same. I thought this was a really interesting point, whether or not I found the author likable. A system of living that preys on peoples' poverty? What's not to condemn in that?
So, is the game really the same? The author compares the people in the financial industry who brought us the 2008 crash to the pawnbrokers, claiming it's only a 'difference in scale'. I'm not sure I buy that argument; I think it's also a difference in kind.
One thing that comes through in this piece is the pawnbrokers' intimate familiarity with their clients and ultimately the degree to which their operation is grounded in those realities; the quick estimation of redemption rate being the touchstone there. It seems to me that a big part of what's wrong in finance is an utter disconnection to any ground truth; the tranches of bundled securities and futures came to be pure abstractions, engaged with on their own terms and free of cumbersome meaning.
The author says that they became a subprime lender, and that's true -- but the financial crash didn't come from the subprime lenders themselves. It came from the bundling and repackaging of bad debt, and the abstraction I mentioned above. I think the author has missed that point rather substantially, and I am willing to concede that he may have been partially blinded by the contempt you all point out.
posted by dbx at 12:36 PM on February 10, 2020 [14 favorites]
The obvious heart of the piece is the pullquote above the fold: wherever you go, the game is the same. I thought this was a really interesting point, whether or not I found the author likable. A system of living that preys on peoples' poverty? What's not to condemn in that?
So, is the game really the same? The author compares the people in the financial industry who brought us the 2008 crash to the pawnbrokers, claiming it's only a 'difference in scale'. I'm not sure I buy that argument; I think it's also a difference in kind.
One thing that comes through in this piece is the pawnbrokers' intimate familiarity with their clients and ultimately the degree to which their operation is grounded in those realities; the quick estimation of redemption rate being the touchstone there. It seems to me that a big part of what's wrong in finance is an utter disconnection to any ground truth; the tranches of bundled securities and futures came to be pure abstractions, engaged with on their own terms and free of cumbersome meaning.
The author says that they became a subprime lender, and that's true -- but the financial crash didn't come from the subprime lenders themselves. It came from the bundling and repackaging of bad debt, and the abstraction I mentioned above. I think the author has missed that point rather substantially, and I am willing to concede that he may have been partially blinded by the contempt you all point out.
posted by dbx at 12:36 PM on February 10, 2020 [14 favorites]
I thought this was an interesting read. I knew how pawn shops operated, but never heard any personal stories from one. There was a pawn shop near where I used to live and I stopped in a couple times out of curiosity. It was along the lines of what sciatic described. There was some "tacky" jewelry for sale (in my opinion) but mostly nice looking goods on display. Everything was very clean and presentable. I toyed with the idea of buying a guitar then, and they had several very nice ones on display. This was in a pretty run-down area, too.
posted by SoberHighland at 12:42 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by SoberHighland at 12:42 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
So the author is contemptuous. Honestly, so what?
Well, as you point out, approaching a topic with contempt means it becomes very easy to miss big things. This is particularly true when it's classist contempt we're talking about: each person in the narrative is a punchline, an illustration of the rural stupidity of the characters, being taken in and abused in turn by each of the figures in their lives, riddled with diseases like scabies. (Ugh, you can hear the narrator sigh in his breathless disgust, scabies, who gets that?) The disgust means that it is harder to think clearly about why pawnshop patrons might go to the pawnshop, and understand why the businesses persist despite the loans and interest.
Of course, being fucking poor is a big part of it, but it's not everything. If you're a poor person, why patronize a pawnbroker over a payday loan? Well, a pawnbroker's loan ends when you decide not to pay: the pawnbroker keeps whatever your item is, and you might be able to buy it back later if you need to, but you won't have the lender hunting your blood until they can squeeze money out of you you might not have. If you don't need your collateral at all, you can sell it outright and have a convenient place to get money without further strings attached. You might be able to score little luxuries you can't otherwise afford at the pawn shop, too: e-readers, gaming systems, big-screen televisions, purses you might be able to use to get yourself a better job. People like to give money to people that already have it, after all, and a pawnshop can provide cheaper access to the kinds of goods that people with money use to telegraph that fact.
Also, just with respect to posting something like this here, when people feel that the tone of the room has already been tainted by contempt, they become unwilling to post and their potential contributions to the topic are lost. Again, let me point out to you, much of my chosen family in this city are or have been pawnbrokers. Imagine your loved ones and friends painted with this brush. Imagine this man describing you, with all his little flourishes and dollops of shame loaded onto the stricture points in your life: you ugly, unfashionable person, with your miserable skin ailments and lack of pants, you carnies who accept probably-stolen property without turning a hair, you credulous dullards with your belief in aliens--ha! aliens! can you imagine?
You want to chime in on how pawnshops work and how you've gotten value out of them, or how they've fucked you over and why you dealt with it, now? You want to admit you're one of this lot? You want to speak up and say "hey, you've missed something" going forward?
Jesus. Saying "so what" to contempt only happens if you don't think anyone in the room who matters might take offense.
posted by sciatrix at 1:17 PM on February 10, 2020 [42 favorites]
Well, as you point out, approaching a topic with contempt means it becomes very easy to miss big things. This is particularly true when it's classist contempt we're talking about: each person in the narrative is a punchline, an illustration of the rural stupidity of the characters, being taken in and abused in turn by each of the figures in their lives, riddled with diseases like scabies. (Ugh, you can hear the narrator sigh in his breathless disgust, scabies, who gets that?) The disgust means that it is harder to think clearly about why pawnshop patrons might go to the pawnshop, and understand why the businesses persist despite the loans and interest.
Of course, being fucking poor is a big part of it, but it's not everything. If you're a poor person, why patronize a pawnbroker over a payday loan? Well, a pawnbroker's loan ends when you decide not to pay: the pawnbroker keeps whatever your item is, and you might be able to buy it back later if you need to, but you won't have the lender hunting your blood until they can squeeze money out of you you might not have. If you don't need your collateral at all, you can sell it outright and have a convenient place to get money without further strings attached. You might be able to score little luxuries you can't otherwise afford at the pawn shop, too: e-readers, gaming systems, big-screen televisions, purses you might be able to use to get yourself a better job. People like to give money to people that already have it, after all, and a pawnshop can provide cheaper access to the kinds of goods that people with money use to telegraph that fact.
Also, just with respect to posting something like this here, when people feel that the tone of the room has already been tainted by contempt, they become unwilling to post and their potential contributions to the topic are lost. Again, let me point out to you, much of my chosen family in this city are or have been pawnbrokers. Imagine your loved ones and friends painted with this brush. Imagine this man describing you, with all his little flourishes and dollops of shame loaded onto the stricture points in your life: you ugly, unfashionable person, with your miserable skin ailments and lack of pants, you carnies who accept probably-stolen property without turning a hair, you credulous dullards with your belief in aliens--ha! aliens! can you imagine?
You want to chime in on how pawnshops work and how you've gotten value out of them, or how they've fucked you over and why you dealt with it, now? You want to admit you're one of this lot? You want to speak up and say "hey, you've missed something" going forward?
Jesus. Saying "so what" to contempt only happens if you don't think anyone in the room who matters might take offense.
posted by sciatrix at 1:17 PM on February 10, 2020 [42 favorites]
Musical instruments sometimes, but mostly guitars.
How sad that the time when pawn shops didn't know what old guitars were worth is done....a friend of mine got a pre-war Martin parlour guitar, albeit needing some work, for $75, once.....those days are over.
posted by thelonius at 1:57 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
How sad that the time when pawn shops didn't know what old guitars were worth is done....a friend of mine got a pre-war Martin parlour guitar, albeit needing some work, for $75, once.....those days are over.
posted by thelonius at 1:57 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
The author's style has already been commented upon, but I just had to pull this bit out: "in an unthwarted, non-provincial modality, he might have been a statistics quant."
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:11 PM on February 10, 2020 [7 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:11 PM on February 10, 2020 [7 favorites]
…I soon left for Bloomington, Indiana, a college town about fifty miles from where I was born. There at my brother’s apartment I could rest easier on a spare air mattress, I believed, for three months or so. Three years later, I returned to New York.
This, from the first paragraph, pretty clearly broadcasts that the author is holding a good deal of resentment about his time back home in Indiana. I also grew up in Indiana and now live on one of the coasts, and the article's tone fairly accurately captured what I imagine it would feel like to be forced to move back and take any job I could get to survive. Although, after reading the comments here, I recognize that the author's choice of material to write about from that 3 year period reveals a great deal about his personal hangups, which I did not pick up on during first read due to connecting with the piece on a different plane.
posted by smokysunday at 2:12 PM on February 10, 2020 [4 favorites]
This, from the first paragraph, pretty clearly broadcasts that the author is holding a good deal of resentment about his time back home in Indiana. I also grew up in Indiana and now live on one of the coasts, and the article's tone fairly accurately captured what I imagine it would feel like to be forced to move back and take any job I could get to survive. Although, after reading the comments here, I recognize that the author's choice of material to write about from that 3 year period reveals a great deal about his personal hangups, which I did not pick up on during first read due to connecting with the piece on a different plane.
posted by smokysunday at 2:12 PM on February 10, 2020 [4 favorites]
sciatrix, thanks for your response -- what I meant was: let's try to engage with the intended content of the piece rather than stop at the condemnation of the author's attitude. Which I then tried to do. I definitely don't mean to dismiss it as something nobody should care about, which makes "so what" a really poor way to say it. Sorry!
So beyond sneering at his roots, what was the author's goal? I argued above that I don't think he achieved it, but I'm interested in hearing other perspectives.
posted by dbx at 2:28 PM on February 10, 2020 [4 favorites]
So beyond sneering at his roots, what was the author's goal? I argued above that I don't think he achieved it, but I'm interested in hearing other perspectives.
posted by dbx at 2:28 PM on February 10, 2020 [4 favorites]
At first I was taken aback by the general reaction to the author's tone. Since when is Metafilter concerned about being contemptuous about Trumpers? I interpreted the contempt as solely directed at those who traffic in misery. The weird idiolect of the proprietor was weird, and I don't think the author did more than report that it existed. Further, I definitely picked up on the self-loathing that the author has not yet successfully dealt with from working in that shop.
I left Bloomington during the same period the author moved back. I also connected with the piece on a personal level. The author and I's time in B-town overlapped, but we never (to my knowledge) crossed paths. I don't have such omni-directional disgust with my experience there. Actually, I moved into the co-op and had one of the best periods of my life right about then. I will say this: the very second you step out of the IU bubble into Southern Indiana, be it at the city limits or even some of the gas stations, you very suddenly and unmistakably notice that you're in the state where the South prolapsed north. Disclaimer: the South isn't all bad, but we're not talking about fellow Hoosier-by-birth Patricia Lockwood's current town of Savannah, Georgia here, but Bobby Knight's Bloomington.
Presumably there are ways to run a pawn shop that are as morally neutral as any other store, but these people seemed more like vultures who happily take money even when the customer looks high, or is suspected of selling hot merchandise, or has hit bottom.
On reflection, this guy's bile really is unappealing. I am particularly concerned by the identifying details in the piece -- not of the owner and his family specifically, but about the customer Ms. D--. Plus I think I found the shop in question in about 10 seconds of searching. Gross.
posted by wires at 2:31 PM on February 10, 2020 [9 favorites]
I left Bloomington during the same period the author moved back. I also connected with the piece on a personal level. The author and I's time in B-town overlapped, but we never (to my knowledge) crossed paths. I don't have such omni-directional disgust with my experience there. Actually, I moved into the co-op and had one of the best periods of my life right about then. I will say this: the very second you step out of the IU bubble into Southern Indiana, be it at the city limits or even some of the gas stations, you very suddenly and unmistakably notice that you're in the state where the South prolapsed north. Disclaimer: the South isn't all bad, but we're not talking about fellow Hoosier-by-birth Patricia Lockwood's current town of Savannah, Georgia here, but Bobby Knight's Bloomington.
Presumably there are ways to run a pawn shop that are as morally neutral as any other store, but these people seemed more like vultures who happily take money even when the customer looks high, or is suspected of selling hot merchandise, or has hit bottom.
On reflection, this guy's bile really is unappealing. I am particularly concerned by the identifying details in the piece -- not of the owner and his family specifically, but about the customer Ms. D--. Plus I think I found the shop in question in about 10 seconds of searching. Gross.
posted by wires at 2:31 PM on February 10, 2020 [9 favorites]
I will also gently note that I currently live in Austin, TX, and before that came from Athens, GA, and that Bloomington, IN is both quite similar to both of those places and actually one of the most likely cities for me to wind up next. And I mean, y'all who left: not everyone is able to leave, and not everyone is able to write off every possible avenue of work that might take them into the South, either.
Given who I am and who my (nonbinary) partner is and that both of my friends are queer women, one of whom isn't white--and who once memorably threw a man who tried to sell a locket with Nathan Bedford Forrest on it straight out of the shop, on offensiveness grounds--I wonder at all the people that y'all didn't notice back in the sticks who wanted better for those areas, too. I get trauma at having escaped places that were Bad for you, and I absolutely get not wanting to live in places that are being held hostile by malevolent *ists, but at the same time it's really not good to use place and class as unwitting synonyms for the racism and classism held by the people in power in an area. It is bad tactics and it reinforces systemic prejudices.
I don't have any sympathy for Trump supporters, but with one exception, that author didn't mention the political beliefs of anyone in that piece. All he said was that they were poor, and they had some icky diseases, and one woman was really desperate for money in a way he thought was funny and gross. If y'all want to make any meaningful changes in terms of political solidarity, you have to catch this kind of unconscious, unthinking disgust and assumption about who votes what before you slip up. Otherwise you're throwing potential allies out into the street without batting a hair. It's really gross, I have been complaining about it here for a damn long time, and honestly I am just fucking tired at this point.
Focus your ire on people who actually deserve it, and make damn sure they actually do deserve it before you fire. Please.
posted by sciatrix at 3:38 PM on February 10, 2020 [31 favorites]
Given who I am and who my (nonbinary) partner is and that both of my friends are queer women, one of whom isn't white--and who once memorably threw a man who tried to sell a locket with Nathan Bedford Forrest on it straight out of the shop, on offensiveness grounds--I wonder at all the people that y'all didn't notice back in the sticks who wanted better for those areas, too. I get trauma at having escaped places that were Bad for you, and I absolutely get not wanting to live in places that are being held hostile by malevolent *ists, but at the same time it's really not good to use place and class as unwitting synonyms for the racism and classism held by the people in power in an area. It is bad tactics and it reinforces systemic prejudices.
I don't have any sympathy for Trump supporters, but with one exception, that author didn't mention the political beliefs of anyone in that piece. All he said was that they were poor, and they had some icky diseases, and one woman was really desperate for money in a way he thought was funny and gross. If y'all want to make any meaningful changes in terms of political solidarity, you have to catch this kind of unconscious, unthinking disgust and assumption about who votes what before you slip up. Otherwise you're throwing potential allies out into the street without batting a hair. It's really gross, I have been complaining about it here for a damn long time, and honestly I am just fucking tired at this point.
Focus your ire on people who actually deserve it, and make damn sure they actually do deserve it before you fire. Please.
posted by sciatrix at 3:38 PM on February 10, 2020 [31 favorites]
I don't have any sympathy for Trump supporters, but with one exception, that author didn't mention the political beliefs of anyone in that piece.
I though there was more, so I looked again.
W— was a self-proclaimed anarchist, at least until the Tea Party came along;
T— and his sons, giddy with vengefulness, had begun attending Tea Party rallies, and they in turn became crazier with anger and more solemn and more expressly racist. It wasn’t long before they traded their anarchic witticisms for ready-made inanities directed at socialists and immigrants—
less directly:
I told the rest of the pawnbrokers. Incredulous, they berated me for rejecting his Nazi paraphernalia, which they knew to be highly collectible in those parts.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:05 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
I though there was more, so I looked again.
W— was a self-proclaimed anarchist, at least until the Tea Party came along;
T— and his sons, giddy with vengefulness, had begun attending Tea Party rallies, and they in turn became crazier with anger and more solemn and more expressly racist. It wasn’t long before they traded their anarchic witticisms for ready-made inanities directed at socialists and immigrants—
less directly:
I told the rest of the pawnbrokers. Incredulous, they berated me for rejecting his Nazi paraphernalia, which they knew to be highly collectible in those parts.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:05 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
I lived in Bloomington during those years, and... Wow. I worked some not-so-great jobs then for very little compensation, but I don't have stories like that. And if I did, I'm not sure I'd tell them, at least not that way.
I suppose I might feel different about it if any of my jobs had featured less wage theft and repetitive stress injury, and more people without pants. Probably not, though.
posted by asperity at 4:07 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
I suppose I might feel different about it if any of my jobs had featured less wage theft and repetitive stress injury, and more people without pants. Probably not, though.
posted by asperity at 4:07 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
to be less oblique, the knowledge the author, and now us, has about the political beliefs - mentioned more than once - of the pawnbrokers changes our understandings of the interactions they had then.
New knowldege reframes old memories.
Imagine your loved ones and friends painted with this brush. ... and who once memorably threw a man who tried to sell a locket with Nathan Bedford Forrest on it straight out of the shop, on offensiveness grounds
sounds like your chosen family wouldn't have berated the author for not accepting the knives.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:19 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
New knowldege reframes old memories.
Imagine your loved ones and friends painted with this brush. ... and who once memorably threw a man who tried to sell a locket with Nathan Bedford Forrest on it straight out of the shop, on offensiveness grounds
sounds like your chosen family wouldn't have berated the author for not accepting the knives.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:19 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
sciatrix: "It's a pawnshop, not a damn junk shop. A well run pawnshop only takes in items that can be easily and reliably resold at a mark-up. That's how they do business."
But the piece argues that in 2010 Bloomington, IN, that's not how a pawnshop works. Maybe in Austin it's about resale, but in that Bloomington pawn shop it's all about the interest on the loan you give. In that case the line between a pawnshop and a payday loan looks pretty thin.
I understand your chosen family has participated in this business. But I think that fact is blinding you to the idea that pawnshops can (often?) be exploitative businesses. I am sympathetic to the idea that sometimes both oppressor and oppressed are forced into their positions, but I think you are arguing that in fact pawnshops are a morally neutral or even positive business. And that's a perspective I find troubling.
posted by crazy with stars at 4:42 PM on February 10, 2020 [8 favorites]
But the piece argues that in 2010 Bloomington, IN, that's not how a pawnshop works. Maybe in Austin it's about resale, but in that Bloomington pawn shop it's all about the interest on the loan you give. In that case the line between a pawnshop and a payday loan looks pretty thin.
I understand your chosen family has participated in this business. But I think that fact is blinding you to the idea that pawnshops can (often?) be exploitative businesses. I am sympathetic to the idea that sometimes both oppressor and oppressed are forced into their positions, but I think you are arguing that in fact pawnshops are a morally neutral or even positive business. And that's a perspective I find troubling.
posted by crazy with stars at 4:42 PM on February 10, 2020 [8 favorites]
I thought it was fascinating.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 4:55 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by Ursula Hitler at 4:55 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
I have feelings about this, since my dad was always pawning shit, to the point that when he died we briefly debated making a pass through all the local pawn shops to check for outstanding items (we did not, because JFC I'm not a masochist and I don't really need more stuff).
Pawnshops are by-and-large exploitative as fuck, in my sadly somewhat broad experience across the continent.
I also hit the pawn shops a couple weeks before any major holiday because I am a somewhat unethical person and know that that's when to get the good shit.
posted by aspersioncast at 5:40 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
Pawnshops are by-and-large exploitative as fuck, in my sadly somewhat broad experience across the continent.
I also hit the pawn shops a couple weeks before any major holiday because I am a somewhat unethical person and know that that's when to get the good shit.
posted by aspersioncast at 5:40 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
My belief is the author binge-watched all of Schitt's Creek in a weekend, and then wrote this article in what he thought was the voice of Dan Levy's character.
posted by sideshow at 6:11 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by sideshow at 6:11 PM on February 10, 2020 [1 favorite]
I have not read the fucking article. I’m not sure I will be able to because I remember my mom giving me jewelry once when she had unexpectedly gotten money. It was when I was in college. She said I could always pawn it if I ever needed to. I don’t remember her ever owning anything of value. Literally. She didn’t drive, so no car. Costume jewelry only.
So maybe she was giving me something she had never had, something valuable enough that you could pawn. Of course she gave me the kind of jewelry that an unworldly person would think was valuable, a fragile and low-quality opal ring in a low-quality gold setting. My mom was trying to give me some kind of plan B with that ring. She loved me so much and had no other idea how to help me. Man, it sucks to be poor.
posted by Bella Donna at 6:42 PM on February 10, 2020 [30 favorites]
So maybe she was giving me something she had never had, something valuable enough that you could pawn. Of course she gave me the kind of jewelry that an unworldly person would think was valuable, a fragile and low-quality opal ring in a low-quality gold setting. My mom was trying to give me some kind of plan B with that ring. She loved me so much and had no other idea how to help me. Man, it sucks to be poor.
posted by Bella Donna at 6:42 PM on February 10, 2020 [30 favorites]
I also lived in Bloomington in that same era and yeah it's a town that's beset with some honestly grotesque people; the screaming racist people who occupied the park that was on the site of a former black power bookstore that had been fire bombed were a prime example. At the same time the writer of this piece has such an obvious contempt for the the poor of this region that it's mean spirited.
posted by Ferreous at 6:59 PM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by Ferreous at 6:59 PM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
The author describes people trapped in impossible-to-win situations. I didn't see anywhere where he berated anyone for not making better choices. Even the mother who bought stuff with her student loan was doing what she could to keep her kids occupied since a babysitter was impossible to afford. This is describing a person acting within the scope of their options and slipping further and further in over their heads.
posted by Space Coyote at 7:30 PM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by Space Coyote at 7:30 PM on February 10, 2020 [3 favorites]
I wandered through the aisles until a woman with a bowl cut approached. As she breathlessly narrated, unsolicited, her recent bout with scabies, I recognized her voice from the voicemail.
If this happened to me, I would totally include it in an article. I would not be an asshole about my new boss’s accent, however. I do think the topic is fascinating. I do not think the author is fascinating. Or rather, I find his voice as a writer both precious and stilted at times. That said, I appreciate the post, OP. Thanks for posting. Sometimes we also serve who serve as bad examples, IMHO. Not everyone likes my writing style, either. Of course, those folks are wrong. :-)
posted by Bella Donna at 7:40 PM on February 10, 2020 [5 favorites]
If this happened to me, I would totally include it in an article. I would not be an asshole about my new boss’s accent, however. I do think the topic is fascinating. I do not think the author is fascinating. Or rather, I find his voice as a writer both precious and stilted at times. That said, I appreciate the post, OP. Thanks for posting. Sometimes we also serve who serve as bad examples, IMHO. Not everyone likes my writing style, either. Of course, those folks are wrong. :-)
posted by Bella Donna at 7:40 PM on February 10, 2020 [5 favorites]
When I was younger I worked as a stocktaker, and the company I worked for did quite a lot of pawnshops, usually after hours, when they changed hands or a pawn franchise was bought out by another; the buyer always wanted a third party to certify the quantity and worth of the goods. They were nothing like this one; in Australia they're generally efficient, clean, run by matter-of-fact people who work their businesses in the spirit of low margins, high turnover, low pay for staff, reliable prices. They did, admittedly, seem to have gruesome senses of humour, and I recall one guy who said hey fiasco, come over here, look at every single one of these—a rack full of wedding rings in a safe—and said, every single one of these is the end of a relationship. It made my skin crawl, but I far preferred counting pawnshops to other kinds of businesses I could name.
The managers and staff in pawnshops tended to look down—as do I, when I'm honest with myself—on payday (very short term) loan operators, who do the high-interest lending but don't make a pretence of any kind of trade in physical commodities. And that's the difference I think, that the value of the business, that I was there to measure for the tax accountants, was in the potential sale price of the stuff it held, as much as in its financial assets (customers' liabilities).
A pawnbroker who makes that kind of risk error very quickly finds themselves the subject of a 2am stocktake, sold to a shrewder manager.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 9:16 PM on February 10, 2020 [6 favorites]
The managers and staff in pawnshops tended to look down—as do I, when I'm honest with myself—on payday (very short term) loan operators, who do the high-interest lending but don't make a pretence of any kind of trade in physical commodities. And that's the difference I think, that the value of the business, that I was there to measure for the tax accountants, was in the potential sale price of the stuff it held, as much as in its financial assets (customers' liabilities).
I found the same subprime manipulations, the same moral hazard disguised as honorable lending, carried out by a family of pawnbrokers who professed to hate the bankers most of all. There is no cultural divide between the coastal financial elite and the petty usurers in flyover statesThat's not right. 'Moral hazard' isn't what the author thinks it means; and there's both a cultural difference and a business model difference. A pawnbroker doesn't lend on other people's money or on behalf of clients whose interests they don't share, they lend on their own credit, which exists in the form of a room full of power tools, and gold necklaces, and DJ equipment. They might or might not be nice people, they might have scabies even, but that's not what 'moral hazard' is. The whole point of the subprime collapse wasn't that people were lending and borrowing, or even the rates; it was that the networks of creditors lost all sense of the worth of their assets, because everyone started to forget whose interests they were borrowing and lending on, figured (rightly) that they wouldn't be punished if things went wrong, and even thought that they could reclassify debt to guarantee themselves out of risk!
A pawnbroker who makes that kind of risk error very quickly finds themselves the subject of a 2am stocktake, sold to a shrewder manager.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 9:16 PM on February 10, 2020 [6 favorites]
I didn’t have any problem with the article or it’s tone, although it was clear the writer wanted to impress us with his ten-cent words and abstruse sentence structure. Only thing I took issue with was his description of the store’s stock, which seems far more suited to a thrift shop than a pawn shop. I mean, I never spent any time in Bloomington, but I did live in rural Missouri for a number of years, and yeah, he was describing what you’d find in a thrift shop. To the point where, if that’s what they had in their pawn shops, I can’t imagine what they’d have in their thrift shops. My guess is he was exaggerating.
posted by panama joe at 9:31 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by panama joe at 9:31 PM on February 10, 2020 [2 favorites]
(First of all, don't mean that it wasn't worth reading or posting.)
Wow, that is depressing. I thought it was at its most interesting at the end talking about the owner's Tea Party radicalization, when it abruptly stopped.
Help us though, that was written by an editor? I don't even know what this sentence means: "...but where the age of mortality had plummeted to the point where one would pee the bed, free of volition, before achieving the age of Social Security." I can't even, so many examples of bad writing - he's simply not good enough to carry off that level of affectation.
posted by blue shadows at 9:56 PM on February 10, 2020 [6 favorites]
Wow, that is depressing. I thought it was at its most interesting at the end talking about the owner's Tea Party radicalization, when it abruptly stopped.
Help us though, that was written by an editor? I don't even know what this sentence means: "...but where the age of mortality had plummeted to the point where one would pee the bed, free of volition, before achieving the age of Social Security." I can't even, so many examples of bad writing - he's simply not good enough to carry off that level of affectation.
posted by blue shadows at 9:56 PM on February 10, 2020 [6 favorites]
What blue shadows said. That full sentence stopped me in my tracks. Also:
There is no cultural divide between the coastal financial elite and the petty usurers in flyover states
That’s bullshit. It is possible that the author meant to write that there is no moral divide between the coastal financial elite and pawn brokers in Indiana. But as a culturally middle-class person who is culturally middle-class after growing up poor simply because I went to college, there is absolutely a cultural divide between those groups and probably more than one.
posted by Bella Donna at 6:14 AM on February 11, 2020 [7 favorites]
There is no cultural divide between the coastal financial elite and the petty usurers in flyover states
That’s bullshit. It is possible that the author meant to write that there is no moral divide between the coastal financial elite and pawn brokers in Indiana. But as a culturally middle-class person who is culturally middle-class after growing up poor simply because I went to college, there is absolutely a cultural divide between those groups and probably more than one.
posted by Bella Donna at 6:14 AM on February 11, 2020 [7 favorites]
Help us though, that was written by an editor? I don't even know what this sentence means: "...but where the age of mortality had plummeted to the point where one would pee the bed, free of volition, before achieving the age of Social Security." I can't even, so many examples of bad writing - he's simply not good enough to carry off that level of affectation.
My guess is that it conveys that the life expectancy in Bloomington among the poor/working class fell so far below average (like 77) that the unfortunate ravages of really old age (peeing the bed, which happens years after hitting 65 for most) occur before age 65, where 65 represents the first year eligible for Social Security.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:53 AM on February 11, 2020
My guess is that it conveys that the life expectancy in Bloomington among the poor/working class fell so far below average (like 77) that the unfortunate ravages of really old age (peeing the bed, which happens years after hitting 65 for most) occur before age 65, where 65 represents the first year eligible for Social Security.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:53 AM on February 11, 2020
A pawnbroker who makes that kind of risk error very quickly finds themselves the subject of a 2am stocktake, sold to a shrewder manager.
Yeah. It sounds like the most valuable thing that that the pawnbrokers have is precisely the kind of local knowledge about people's character, available employment, and history that local bankers used to need to do mortgage lending. Especially in the days when the local bankers retained the risk.
Think back on those entertaining scenes in The Big Short, where the strippers are buying multiple rental properties with balloon repayments or low introductory rates. Do you think these weird pawnbroking characters would lend like that, and with their own money? Obviously they would not.
The reason they were happy to take things like power tools is not because of the great resale value but because they were often someone's livelihood and they had a pretty good idea that these people would move heaven and earth to buy them back when some work came in.
That’s bullshit. It is possible that the author meant to write that there is no moral divide between the coastal financial elite and pawn brokers in Indiana. But as a culturally middle-class person who is culturally middle-class after growing up poor simply because I went to college, there is absolutely a cultural divide between those groups and probably more than one.
For one thing, members of the coastal financial elite may read The Baffler.
I thought this was going to be article about how all the nastiest little petty fascists are small employers in family owned businesses rather than "the corporations".
posted by atrazine at 10:42 AM on February 11, 2020
Yeah. It sounds like the most valuable thing that that the pawnbrokers have is precisely the kind of local knowledge about people's character, available employment, and history that local bankers used to need to do mortgage lending. Especially in the days when the local bankers retained the risk.
Think back on those entertaining scenes in The Big Short, where the strippers are buying multiple rental properties with balloon repayments or low introductory rates. Do you think these weird pawnbroking characters would lend like that, and with their own money? Obviously they would not.
The reason they were happy to take things like power tools is not because of the great resale value but because they were often someone's livelihood and they had a pretty good idea that these people would move heaven and earth to buy them back when some work came in.
That’s bullshit. It is possible that the author meant to write that there is no moral divide between the coastal financial elite and pawn brokers in Indiana. But as a culturally middle-class person who is culturally middle-class after growing up poor simply because I went to college, there is absolutely a cultural divide between those groups and probably more than one.
For one thing, members of the coastal financial elite may read The Baffler.
I thought this was going to be article about how all the nastiest little petty fascists are small employers in family owned businesses rather than "the corporations".
posted by atrazine at 10:42 AM on February 11, 2020
if that’s what they had in their pawn shops, I can’t imagine what they’d have in their thrift shops.
Even rural MD is like this, and you're never that far from actual cities. The stuff in the pawn shops is thrift store quality, and the stuff in the thrift stores should never have been made in the first place, may very well already be broken, and is certainly unlikely to hold up for a second use.
posted by aspersioncast at 11:12 AM on February 11, 2020 [1 favorite]
Even rural MD is like this, and you're never that far from actual cities. The stuff in the pawn shops is thrift store quality, and the stuff in the thrift stores should never have been made in the first place, may very well already be broken, and is certainly unlikely to hold up for a second use.
posted by aspersioncast at 11:12 AM on February 11, 2020 [1 favorite]
I didn't have high hopes for this piece with "usurer" being up front and center. It's my understanding that the word is often employed as an anti-Semitic dogwhistle. Is the author not aware of this? Does he not care? Did he intend it that way? And what about the editor?
This is from yesterday, but I want to push back on this all the same. No, "usurer" is a valid term and we should think hard about associating it with Jewish people. Usury is predatory lending, which we are well within the realm of good taste in utterly disdaining. Ethnicity doesn't and shouldn't enter the equation. We don't want to get into a situation wherein criticizing 1500% interest rates is somehow considered a Klan talking point.
posted by FakeFreyja at 11:59 AM on February 11, 2020 [9 favorites]
This is from yesterday, but I want to push back on this all the same. No, "usurer" is a valid term and we should think hard about associating it with Jewish people. Usury is predatory lending, which we are well within the realm of good taste in utterly disdaining. Ethnicity doesn't and shouldn't enter the equation. We don't want to get into a situation wherein criticizing 1500% interest rates is somehow considered a Klan talking point.
posted by FakeFreyja at 11:59 AM on February 11, 2020 [9 favorites]
The stuff in the pawn shops is thrift store quality, and the stuff in the thrift stores should never have been made in the first place, may very well already be broken, and is certainly unlikely to hold up for a second use.
My recent experience of thrift store electronics is that Apple was a bunch of jerks for changing the original IPOD/Iphone plug.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:33 PM on February 11, 2020 [2 favorites]
My recent experience of thrift store electronics is that Apple was a bunch of jerks for changing the original IPOD/Iphone plug.
posted by The_Vegetables at 1:33 PM on February 11, 2020 [2 favorites]
Help us though, that was written by an editor?
How about this florid, uh, gem, which contributes nothing to an explanation of how pawnshops work: "The idea, understood by both parties, the broker and you, is that your patchy brown and frost-damaged yard won’t require care until the following March or April, when the first sprouts of green life begin to mock the surrounding deadness."
posted by the_blizz at 1:46 PM on February 11, 2020 [1 favorite]
How about this florid, uh, gem, which contributes nothing to an explanation of how pawnshops work: "The idea, understood by both parties, the broker and you, is that your patchy brown and frost-damaged yard won’t require care until the following March or April, when the first sprouts of green life begin to mock the surrounding deadness."
posted by the_blizz at 1:46 PM on February 11, 2020 [1 favorite]
Usury is predatory lending
Then just call it predatory lending, rather than whining about your right to use a word that has a centuries-old history of being a clear dog whistle calling for deportation, mob violence, confinement to ghettos, and genocide.
For every other kind of racist dog whistle, you can easily recognize that guy who claims that he gets to wave his ugly words around because they only mean what he says they mean, and everyone targeted by his ignorant attitude towards history should just shut up and stop feeling triggered, because he's got something really important to say, bro. That's a basic argument of Trumpist racists, and it shouldn't get a pass here or anywhere else.
posted by fuzz at 5:25 PM on February 11, 2020 [2 favorites]
Then just call it predatory lending, rather than whining about your right to use a word that has a centuries-old history of being a clear dog whistle calling for deportation, mob violence, confinement to ghettos, and genocide.
For every other kind of racist dog whistle, you can easily recognize that guy who claims that he gets to wave his ugly words around because they only mean what he says they mean, and everyone targeted by his ignorant attitude towards history should just shut up and stop feeling triggered, because he's got something really important to say, bro. That's a basic argument of Trumpist racists, and it shouldn't get a pass here or anywhere else.
posted by fuzz at 5:25 PM on February 11, 2020 [2 favorites]
The person who made this point is a MeFite and not the author of the piece. You may have a beef with someone but it is not the poster. The poster argued that the practice of usury should not be equated with being Jewish; why on Earth would you imply that poster is akin to a Trump racist? FFS, folks, let’s drop it.
posted by Bella Donna at 9:26 AM on February 12, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by Bella Donna at 9:26 AM on February 12, 2020 [5 favorites]
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posted by glonous keming at 10:30 AM on February 10, 2020 [16 favorites]