Castle Law Office Blog | Missouri & Illinois Bankruptcy Legal Blog

The Middle Class Gives Bankruptcy a New Feel

The latest study on people who are filing for bankruptcy, done by Harvard Law School professor Elizabeth Warren and Ohio University professor Deborah Thorne, is showing that the middle class has become the new face of bankruptcy. With more than 100,000 middle class families filing for bankruptcy every month in 2007, the study shows that this shift happened even before the recession—and it has only continued since then.

Many of the folks who are now filing bankruptcy are college-educated homeowners who have really just fallen on bad times. So, what does this study really say about the people who file bankruptcy? Well, I think this article and others who have come out with similar stories all come to the same, unspoken conclusion: Overwhelming debt can affect anyone.

Filing bankruptcy doesn’t mean you are a bad person. In fact, it means that you are a good person, willing to take responsibility for your debt and the future welfare of your family.  And while chapter 7 and chapter 13 can help you in different ways, they both relieve the stress that debt can cause you and the ones you love. So, put your energy towards something positive and start looking at ways to relieve your debt.