Jake Halpern. (2014). Bad Paper: Chasing Debt from Wall Street to the Underworld. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Jake Halpern. 2014. Bad Paper: Chasing Debt From Wall Street to the Underworld. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Jake Halpern, Bad Paper: Chasing Debt From Wall Street to the Underworld. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2014.

Jake Halpern. Bad Paper: Chasing Debt From Wall Street to the Underworld. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2014.

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Bad Paper

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Chasing Debt from Wall Street to the Underworld

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   • fileAs: Halpern, Jake
   • bioText: Jake Halpern is the author of Bad Paper, an Amazon Best Book of 2014, and Nightfall, one of a number of young adult novels. His journalism has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Atlantic, among many other publications. He is also a contributor to NPR's All Things Considered and This American Life and teaches journalism at Yale University in New Haven, where he lives.
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The Federal Trade Commission receives more complaints about rogue debt collecting than about any activity besides identity theft. Dramatically and entertainingly, Bad Paper reveals why. It tells the story of Aaron Siegel, a former banking executive, and Brandon Wilson, a former armed robber, who become partners and go in quest of "paper"—the uncollected debts that are sold off by banks for pennies on the dollar. As Aaron and Brandon learn, the world of consumer debt collection is an unregulated shadowland where operators often make unwarranted threats and even collect debts that are not theirs.
Introducing an unforgettable cast of strivers and rogues, Jake Halpern chronicles their lives as they manage high-pressure call centers, hunt for paper in Las Vegas casinos, and meet in parked cars to sell the social security numbers and account information of unsuspecting consumers. He also tracks a "package" of debt that is stolen by unscrupulous collectors, leading to...

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Bad Paper

fullDescription

The Federal Trade Commission receives more complaints about rogue debt collecting than about any activity besides identity theft. Dramatically and entertainingly, Bad Paper reveals why. It tells the story of Aaron Siegel, a former banking executive, and Brandon Wilson, a former armed robber, who become partners and go in quest of "paper"—the uncollected debts that are sold off by banks for pennies on the dollar. As Aaron and Brandon learn, the world of consumer debt collection is an unregulated shadowland where operators often make unwarranted threats and even collect debts that are not theirs.
Introducing an unforgettable cast of strivers and rogues, Jake Halpern chronicles their lives as they manage high-pressure call centers, hunt for paper in Las Vegas casinos, and meet in parked cars to sell the social security numbers and account information of unsuspecting consumers. He also tracks a "package" of debt that is stolen by unscrupulous collectors, leading to a dramatic showdown with guns in a Buffalo corner store. Along the way, he reveals the human cost of a system that compounds the troubles of hardworking Americans and permits banks to ignore their former customers. The result is a vital exposé that is also a bravura feat of storytelling.

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reviews

1. • premium: False
   • source: Frank Tempone, Chicago Tribune
   • content:

     "Bad Paper gives readers an intimate knowledge of the debt-collecting industry, but more important, it gives a comprehensive profile of the people in our country who live and die by the industry. This, ultimately, is the book's power and attraction."

2. • premium: False
   • source: Julia M. Klein, The Boston Globe
   • content: "[A] wonderful inquiry into the seamy, multilayered world of consumer debt collection . . . both an entertaining sociology of the debt-collecting fraternity and a picaresque romp through the industry's most unsavory byways."
3. • premium: False
   • source: Jonathan Epstein, Buffalo News
   • content: "An enjoyable and educational read, with stories that sound too good to be true and word-for-word conversations that a Hollywood screenwriter couldn't make up."
4. • premium: False
   • source: Kirkus
   • content: "A dramatic rise-and-fall tale . . . Halpern brings unexpected literary heft to the world of debt collection."
5. • premium: False
   • source: Publishers Weekly
   • content: "By fostering a greater understanding of the workings of debt collection, [Bad Paper] sheds enough light into the shadows to compel readers to push for change."
6. • premium: False
   • source: Joseph Finder, bestselling author of Suspicion and Paranoia
   • content: "Bad Paper is nonfiction that reads like the finest thriller: suspenseful and frightening, eye-opening, and even, at times, funny. Jake Halpern's fascinating, fearless tour of the underworld of debt collections introduces us to a cast of characters--the (mostly) men behind the scary phone calls--who deserve to be the stars of the next great HBO drama."
7. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     Starred review from September 1, 2014
     Author and journalist Halpern (Fame Junkies) reports from a “shadowy corner of the economy”—the world of consumer-debt collection, which “remains dysfunctional and largely unsupervised.” Our entry to this world is Aaron Siegel, a former banking executive who left his job on Wall Street in 2005 and returned to his hometown of Buffalo. He began to operate as a privately financed debt buyer—buying and selling debt, rather than trying to collect on it—and found an unlikely partner in Brandon Wilson, a former armed robber turned debt collector. Halpern’s narrative follows these two in the “aboveground economy” (that is, the consumer-debt marketplace)—tracking down a rogue collection agency that stole their debt, answering to million dollar investors, getting tips on deals at a Las Vegas debt buyer’s conference, etc. The author then delves into the inner workings of what he refers to as the “financial underworld.” Here, debt is bought and sold with no questions asked. Halpern also discusses the regulatory climate of the current economy; these details combined with the narrative, a startling picture emerges. By fostering a greater understanding of the workings of debt collection, the book sheds enough light into the shadows to compel readers to push for change. Agent: Tina Bennett, WME.

8. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     August 1, 2014
     An investigation of the bottom-feeding underworld of debt collecting and its disreputable cast of rip-off artists. As journalist and novelist Halpern (Dormia, 2009, etc.) discovered, the world of debt collection is every bit as scummy (and possibly scummier) as its reputation has always suggested. "Some thirty-five million consumers-roughly 14% of all Americans-are currently being hounded over at least one loan," he writes. The author delivers a tale of two kinds of lowlifes and their collaboration in a lowest-common-denominator business that makes Wall Street look meek and ethical. Halpern begins with a focus on former banker Aaron Siegel, who moved back to his financially downtrodden hometown of Buffalo, N.Y., rounded up $14 million from chummy investors and opened his own private equity fund specializing in debt collection. After being ripped off by his own shady employees, who stole a huge portfolio of debt out from under his nose and started their own rogue agency, Siegel decided to employ the help of ex-bank robber Brandon Wilson to help strong-arm the debt collection competition into submission. Halpern tracks not only Siegel and Wilson's quixotic quest for the stolen debt, but also the ugly, everyday inner workings of the business as a whole, much of which is based in crime-ridden, economically destitute Buffalo. The predominantly unethical practice of buying, selling and collecting debt is carried out by just the sort of societal outcasts you'd expect-usually, ex-cons or other desperate, otherwise unemployable screw-ups fill the business's ranks. Halpern's story of the debt collection world is also a dramatic rise-and-fall tale that traces the anything-goes heyday of debt collecting businesses in the unregulated early 2000s and how it has changed with the consequential recent Obama-era crackdowns on the shadier practices in the field. As we see in the book, these new regulations make it much harder for miscreants like Siegel and Wilson to survive. Halpern brings unexpected literary heft to the world of debt collection.

     COPYRIGHT(2014) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

9. • premium: True
   • source:
   • content:

     Starred review from October 15, 2014
     

     Halpern's (Fame Junkies) breathtaking expose takes readers on a deep dive into the debt collection industry. The book proceeds chronologically from 2008 to today, following former Buffalo banker Aaron Siegel and his ex-con partner Brandon Wilson in their quest for money. Three sections relate how Siegel tracked stolen debt-collection files that he bought, how a collection agency operates, and how the industry is largely unregulated and hugely profitable. Rather than focusing on statistics or quote regulators, Halpern succeeds in illustrating how Americans' appetite for consumer credit and the country's bank accounting rules have left much "meat on the bone" for collectors. The author also includes interviews with several hapless debtors who thought that they had paid their debts but were tricked by unsavory collectors. He shows that, as with the subprime mortgage crisis, when debt is packaged and resold, there may not be proof of the underlying obligation. Worse yet, the debt may be beyond the legal statute of limitations, and still, naive debtors are cajoled into paying. VERDICT Colorful and chilling, this work is an important peek into the dark corner of consumer finance and recommended for all consumers and true crime aficionados.--Harry Charles, St. Louis

     Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

subtitle

Chasing Debt from Wall Street to the Underworld

popularity

128

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Farrar, Straus and Giroux

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