So for a time in her career she helped corporations defend their bankruptcies. According to one source- "She helped
LTV Steel in its effort to dodge paying employee benefits in 1995; helped defend the
Travelers Insurance company in a 2009 Supreme Court case against consumer asbestos claims and did bankruptcy consulting work for
Dow Chemical after a lawsuit by thousands of women with allegedly faulty breast implants that caused health problems."
More details:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/eli...class-champion
In a 1987 law journal article, she said a named colleague believed that "the only goal of bankruptcy is to enhance the collection efforts of creditors with state-defined property rights." By contrast she said to her that "bankruptcy policy becomes a composite of factors that bear on a better answer to the question, "How shall the losses be distributed?" A quick read of the 40 page article seems to boil down to: stuff happens that makes it unlikely or impossible for debtors to fully pay creditors. Once that happens, yeah, you have to decided how the losses will be distributed and that debtor law is not the same as simply collections law and can consider issues of social justice and well-being.
There were debates about her data and conclusions.
Another article said: "In 1989, she, the sociologist Teresa Sullivan, and fellow law prof Jay Westbrook, published
As We Forgive Our Debtors, a detailed study of 1,500 bankruptcy filings in three states. Warren et al found that bankrupts were not driven by fraud or a simple unwillingness to pay — they were just broke, deeply in debt, and had no other options. That contradicted the assertions of the credit industry, which blamed the long rise in bankruptcy filings on the 1978 revisions to the bankruptcy code, which they saw as too debtor-friendly. It was too easy to wipe out debt, and the creditor class wanted to change that." It comes down to who to help and how much.
When Warren and Biden sparred on the issue a couple of decades ago, the case was over a proposed law but the argument imo was more about the two sides of the debtor creditor relationship. In this case, credit card companies vs consumers in financial difficulty. Law and policy are intertwined and sometimes conflicted. Neither can really hang sufficiently on its own.
More detail here:
https://www.boston.com/news/politics...n-2020-history
Further history of what happened: "A tightening of the code passed both houses of Congress and was the last piece of legislation sent to Bill Clinton for his signature. He and the administration were all for it, but Hillary, after being briefed on the topic by Elizabeth Warren, convinced her husband to veto the bill. (Warren tells the story to Bill Moyers in this
video.) It came back a few years later, and George W. Bush signed it. By then, Hillary had evolved. She supported it and encouraged its passage — though, in classic Hillary fashion, she didn’t cast a vote on the bill. (Joe Biden did — a yes.) It was going to pass, so why leave a possibly embarrassing stain on your record if you’re planning to run for president?"
And more context: "The credit card giant MBNA—at the time, the
third-largest issuer of credit cards—was based in [Biden's] home state. Its executives and employees were some of Biden’s biggest campaign contributors, giving more than $200,000 over the course of his career,
according to the Center for Responsive Politics. One of Biden’s sons, Hunter, worked at MBNA after graduating from law school and later consulted for the company after a stint in the Commerce Department."
https://www.politico.com/magazine/st...cy-bill-225728
And more followup, if you want it:
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-polit...5-biden-warren
The issue comes now again with regard to bankruptcy law and student loans:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfri.../#1d4b05d27fdc
Were the borrowers sympathetic victims of broken economy and broken lending laws? And / or living beyond means and failing to be make sufficient effort to repay obligations? Up for different readings.
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