Is Bankruptcy Now Socially Acceptable?

In our grandparents day, if a late payment was made for any bill, it was a very big deal. And there was a moral stigma attached to it. Oh how we've slipped. Nowadays, it's no big deal to make a late payment or miss a payment altogether. Missed or late with the telephone bill? Eh, catch up next month. While it seems that it has become more commonplace for people to feel very casual about letting the small bills slide a bit, I've always felt that the big bills like houses and cars still had some respect. With the media constantly reporting on housing foreclosures (over 2 million+ now!) it seems like many of those who could probably struggle to make the payment just giving up and "just walking away." I'm not just talking about lower/middle class people here; famous people: movie stars, sports figures and other celebrities. It has become morally acceptable to have the bank foreclose on your home. And that's what concerns me the most. Sure, there are going to be people that just can't afford to make a payment, but then there are others (those that could afford to make the payment) who now incorporate defaulting on a housing payment as part of their financial planning. As little as a generation ago, defaulting on a loan was done in secrecy and shame, now is seems as if you're part of a new social club: "I was smart enough to walk away [from the promise I made to repay the loan]." Certainly stricter lending standards are needed. Maybe they should include a personality and lie detector test as part of the standards too.