Debt Collections Good For the Economy

There are many activities that help boost our economy. A healthy jobs market, business spending, banks lending money as well as consumer spending. But did you know that debt collections were also a big part of a healthy economy?

For the consumer that may be in debt or having issues trying to catch up on financial obligations, they might not think so. But the collection industry is directly responsible for putting a large amount of money back into our economy and into the hands of business.

The latest data coming from a 2020 State of the Industry report indicates that over $90 Billion dollars was pumped back into the US economy as a result of the efforts of the collection industry. That number indicates an average of $706 per household of savings in the US.

Why should anyone care?

That’s pretty simple. By getting a business the money that is already owed to them, that keeps pricing lower. That’s the first reason why debt collections matter to the economy and to the consumer in general. If a business cannot collect the money that should already be in their possession, that causes that organization to make some choices. And one choice they need to make is to raise prices to compensate.

Jobs. Not only does the collection industry save jobs by helping a business with cash flow but the industry itself employees nearly 125,000 professionals across the country, creating meaningful careers for those individuals.

Community involvement is also a large part of the collection industry. Over $108 million was raised and donated to non-profit organizations as a direct result of community efforts by collection agencies. And volunteers hours were even more impressive. It is estimated that close to 524,000 hours of volunteer work was done by those in this industry, providing much-needed support to charities.

Helping consumers

While we understand the apprehension from many consumers when they end up on a collection call, what happens at least here at American Profit Recovery, is that our trained professionals begin to help that consumer get out of a challenging financial situation. Our collectors walk a consumer through a number of questions to gain an understanding of why they are in collections and they seek to solve that problem together.

When you help a consumer get out of debt, that helps our economy. It helps a business that now has their money and it helps the consumer make better financial choice when spending their money. Hopefully by going through the collection process, that consumer now has more money to spend more wisely. When we help consumers, we help our economy.

As a side note, we often get compliments from the consumers we call. Like these.

-Thank you so much , you guys are seriously so nice debt collectors, you make people want to pay their debts , like such nice people, thank you so much .

-Thank you so much for your assistance, and thank you for calling me ,  I wasn’t aware of this. I really appreciate all your help.

Local Government

We always complain about our taxes and fees and wonder why our government cannot manage a budget. The debt collection industry has played a major role in helping to control your local taxes and fees by helping to get residents caught up on various late payments. From utilities, local taxes, tolls, parking fees and others, the debt collection industry has recovered an estimated $106 million in state and local taxes and fees and well over $1.1 billion in federal money due to their activities. This only benefits consumers as well as the overall economy.

You might want to understand where these number come from. We see many industry snapshots in the news but sometimes, you don’t know where the data came from. In the case of the collection industry, this survey date came from several very credible sources. The data comes from Ernst & Young’s report “The Impact of Third-Party Debt Collection on the US National and State Economies,” the US Census Business Patterns Survey all administer by Kaulkin Ginsberg and commission by ACA International, The Association of Credit and Collection Professionals.

The industry has not enjoyed a favorable image over the years but understanding the critical nature of what we do, should help the public better understand why debt collections is a necessary element of our economy.