" The room was suddenly rich and the great bay-window was
Spawning snow and pink roses against it
Soundlessly collateral and incompatible:
World is suddener than we fancy it...."
"Snow"
Louis Macneice (1935)
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Truly the world is "suddener" than we imagine it. Certainly, one of the things that we find "collateral and incompatible," is the new face of debt collecting.
We discover owners and ceo's of seemingly Shylockian, Dickensian and draconian operations increasingly saturating the headliner list of charitable organizations, sick kids hospitals and fundraising drives.
It's certainly a pity that they show so little mercy to hospital cases like the one in the previous post that fall into their collection portfolio.
Naturally, it's all a snow job in image management. Due to the natural dynamics inherent in capitalism, we involuntarily inhabit a world of increasing debt and decreasing disposable income due to the inevitable polarization of wealth. As Linda Leatherdale, business editor of the Toronto Sun, points out today, it's a situation that increasingly exacerbates itself. That's why personal debt and median income levels, when adjusted for inflation, are steadily increasing.
In the world of Darwin, the strong naturally prey upon the weak to enrich themselves. They're the easiest pickings. Enter billionaire/investor debt buyers and debt collectors.
Let's look at one of the more prominent scavengers on the scene: AktivKapital. You might not recognize the name, and just as likely you won't be able to pronounce the Norwegian management monikers. Yet one of their previous incarnations might ring a bell: PMS, Portfolio Management Solutions. Situated in London, Ontario, they've long been involved in buying up defaulted credit card and bank loans, lines of revolving credit etc. PMS, purchased by a Nowegian group of investors in 2005, and morphed into "AktivKapital, they indeed present a sickening, smiling face to a desperate side of life.
Looking at these MBA's you are manipulated into thinking, through image control, what a swell, caring outfit they must be. And because they call themselves, AktivKaiptal Canada, it is suggested to you that they are a Canadian company - by Canadians for Canadians - a concept that "Mr Joe Canadian" himself, Don Cherry, would endorse,
http://corp.aktivkapital.com/en/About-us/Corporate-Management/
Nonetheless, when you view their corporate history, it's truly saddening to see how the money they extract from the most desperate members of society is continually sucked up and then siphoned out of Canada into their homebase.
http://www.aktivkapital.ca/About-Aktiv-Kapital/History/
Ray