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Cash-strapped families sometimes turn to small, short-term loans with exorbitant fees—payday loans—to cope with mounting medical bills. Given that about three-fourths of payday loan customers are repeat borrowers, consumer advocates and policymakers have increasingly raised voices of concern about the use of payday loans to finance various household expenses, including, among other things, medical bills. The present study hypothesized that increases in medical debt are associated with increases in payday loan debt among a sample of Chapter 7 bankruptcy filers. The results of a multivariate tobit regression analysis showed that medical debt was associated with increased payday loan debt, controlling for various types of debt and other socioeconomic variables. This article concludes with implications of the results for social work policy- and direct-practice.

Payday loans refer to small-dollar, high-interest, short-term loans usually extended to lower-income consumers. Despite much research to the contrary, the payday loan industry asserts that it primarily serves middle-class Americans. This article discusses the authors' investigation of the industry's claim, by analyzing data from a U.S. bankruptcy court serving a Southern district. Results of the multivariate binary logistic regression analysis showed that, controlling for various sociodemographic and economic variables, two middle-class indicators--home-ownership and annual income at or greater than the median income--are associated with a decreased likelihood of using payday loans. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of the results for social work practice and advocacy in regard to financial capability, particularly asset development, income maintenance, and payday loan regulation.

Social policy courses are a staple in social work curricula, particularly in graduate-level social work education. Indeed, policy practice is among the nine social work competencies stipulated by the Council on Social Work Education. The purpose of the present study is to measure the effectiveness of service-learning over traditional-learning methods in obtaining civic and course-learning outcomes. This study utilized a purposive sample of 89 graduate-level social work students enrolled in advanced social policy courses (30 in a service-learning section, and 59 in traditional sections). Employing a quasi-experimental design, this study found that service-learning is associated with better civic and course-learning outcomes. Service-learning may be utilized to enhance policy practice efficacy based on knowledge, skills, values, and competence.