ACA's Pat Morris Takes on USA Today. Who Won?

If you haven’t already, take a moment to visit USA Today for an opinion piece from Friend of the Show Pat Morris, CEO of ACA.

Morris is writing in response to an earlier USA Today unsigned editorial titled “Debt collection abuses cry out for new rules.”

USA Today‘s piece leads with this: “There’s something about a credit boom followed by a recession that brings out the worst in debt collectors.”

So, you know, they’re going to argue from nuance and consideration.

(Also, Dear USA Today And Anyone Else Using FTC Data to Bolster Your Point: The number of FTC complaints against the collection industry is not a useful number to argue with since it is raw data, not scrubbed for complaints that turned out to be unwarranted or baseless. DO GRASP THAT.)

Morris and USA Today appear to be arguing at cross purposes. It doesn’t appear that either had access to each other’s piece. USA Today says: Boy, there sure are a lot of stories about abusive debt collectors out there. Morris says: The collection industry is aiding the economy, but boy is it hard out there for debt buyers. Morris then drops his headline thesis about the economy and instead argues for a lessening of strictures against debt buyers.

So, who won? I don’t even know if that’s a fair question. But if I had to pick, I think I’d have to edge my vote toward USA Today for at least staying on target.

And you guys? Who do you think took home top honors in this argument? Vote in our poll below, and then expound further in the comments section. We always love hearing from you guys.