During the past several decades in the US, three credit bureaus have become so powerful, they can make or break American lives.
They are Equifax, Experian and Trans Union. Any one of them has the capability to cause many sleepless nights of worry for American citizens, and on many levels their power and control rival that exerted by the dreaded IRS.
While it may take only minutes for any company extending credit to provide the bureaus with negative financial information or comments on a person that can stay on an individual’s credit report for up to 10 years, it may take years for an individual to get incorrect negative documentation corrected and/or removed.
The God-like power wielded by “the big 3” was recently brought to light when a woman was deemed an unacceptable applicant for a residential mortgage because the bureaus classified her as dead. Based on misinformation provided by the credit bureaus, she was refused a mortgage.
The power currently exercised by the credit bureaus may also determine whether a prospective employer will hire you since credit reports may be used to prescreen job applicants. Why should a person’s reported financial status determine whether he or she is eligible to be hired for a job? The purported state of a person’s finances should not eliminate the chances of a prospective employee.
It is absurd and unconscionable that entities with such little oversight should have such immense power over the lives of American citizens, and it is time to diminish the extent of that power in the best interests and personal rights of American citizens.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment. We are presently looking for 242 new monthly donors in the next 2 days.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy