Credit Cards: Weapons for Domestic Violence

This law review piece explores the abuse tactic of “coerced debt.” An abuser can coerce a victim into taking on financial debt by fraud such as identity theft, by force, or by other means such as tricking someone into signing the paperwork (p. 290). Author Christine Kim argues “that domestic violence victims have been left behind in credit card regulation, consumer protection policy, and private enforcement” (p. 283).  Kim conducted a study of the policies of credit card issuers regarding coerced debt. She found that “there is no consistency across the top credit card issuers in responding to coerced debt” for domestic violence victims, but that companies appear to have given more thought to the issue of elder abuse involving credit cards (p. 303).