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Comment by tomhoward | Hacker News Reader

I edited my comment to tone down the implication that it's only loan sharks.

That said, the "traditional" payday lenders all turn out to be quite predatory, don't they? (I understand that's what the original founding premise of LendUp was intended to address, even if they couldn't make it work.)

But aside from that, will the traditional payday lenders lend to everyone and anyone, no matter their circumstances? If not, what are the options for people who they won't deal with?

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Sure, I would agree with that characterization. But apparently LendUp was even more predatory, to the point that regulators shut it down. So in retrospect, I think we need to take the claim that they wanted to create a kinder, gentler kind of lending with a grain of salt.

The claim we’re addressing in this subthread is that in 2012 YC knowingly invested in a company that intended to be predatory towards military personnel, such that it would end up being shut down by regulators, implying that YC was both deeply unethical and deeply stupid. Are we really to believe that YC was being as unethical and stupid as this claim requires us to?

"Knowing," "intended [at the time]", "would end up being shut down by regulators" are all your embellishments. The claim is "YC funded a payday lender that targeted active duty military service members." As far as I can tell, that is true, regardless of how pure anyone's intentions were at the time. The defense on offer is that the founders left the company between funding and now, but it is not very compelling given the timelines.

The last part of that comment is quite obtuse. Can you state simply and clearly, what, if anything, YC did that was unethical?

"Unethical" again another embellishment. Perhaps this was simply a case of poor judgment, which isn't unethical to have.

OK then. You weren't the root commenter, but it's pretty clear the root comment and the reply to dang were attempting to pin an accusation of unethical conduct on YC. But never mind.

There of course is another possibility: the founding team in 2011 was proposing a concept that seemed ethical and an improvement over payday lending options that existed at the time, but over time the company's idea or execution changed for some reason, in which case, there was neither poor ethics nor poor judgement on YC's part.

Occam's razor would require us to accept this explanation unless there was substantive evidence for another scenario.

I don’t see the Occam’s razor requires us to accept that over someone simply misrepresenting what their plans were.

By definition, Occam's razor requires us to believe that founders sincerely intended to do what they said they planned to do, unless there is evidence to the contrary.

Yes, but they won't literally break your legs over an unpaid debt anymore. These aren't run by crime syndicates AFAIK.

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