Financial protections for active military might be coming to all

When the Military Lending Act was passed in 2006, it was a big victory.

Payday lenders had been cropping up around military bases, and a number of service members found themselves trapped in a cycle of debt, paying off loans with exorbitant annual rates sometimes around 300 percent.

The law capped interest rates at 36 percent annual interest on loans for active duty service members, but it did not include protections for veterans, surviving spouses or Gold Star families.

Today, there is a bipartisan push to extend those protections to all Americans.

Paul Kantwill is a veteran and law professor at Loyola University in Chicago. He joined MPR host Kerri Miller for a conversation about the origin of the law and the push to broaden it.

To listen to the full conversation you can use the audio player above.

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