Available at: SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=5377387
Summary:
This essay uses Debt's Grip as a point of departure to examine how debt operates as a system of social control in the United States. While the book offers a vivid portrait of those who file for bankruptcy, it also gestures toward a broader reality: millions of financially distressed individuals who never access relief. Drawing on legal scholarship and political theory, this Essay argues that debt disciplines individuals, fragments solidarity, and undermines democratic agency. It proposes a new metric-the ratio of debt collection lawsuits to bankruptcy filings-as a proxy for unmet need, revealing a population of "missing strugglers" visible to creditors but excluded from legal protection. The analysis calls for reimagining legal and political responses to financial distress beyond the bankruptcy system.
Commentary:
In Missing Strugglers: Debt’s Reach, Bankruptcy’s Limits, and a Proxy for Who’s Left Out, Professor Dalié Jiménez uses Debt’s Grip—Pamela Foohey, Robert Lawless, and Deborah Thorne’s recent portrait of bankruptcy filers—as a starting point to explore an even larger population: financially distressed individuals who never file for bankruptcy. While Debt’s Grip captures the stories and statistics of those who do file, Jiménez focuses on those absent from the system yet visible to creditors, courts, and debt buyers—the “missing strugglers.”
Drawing on political theory, racial capitalism scholarship, and data from the Debt Collection Lab, Jiménez argues that debt functions not just as an economic burden but as a mechanism of social control: replacing social provision with credit (Abbye Atkinson), extracting value from the poor (Chrystin Ondersma), shaping self-perception and political agency (Maurizio Lazzarato), and deepening racial inequities (Louise Seamster). The paper proposes a “lawsuit-to-bankruptcy ratio” as an empirical proxy for unmet need, revealing that in many jurisdictions, there are 6–9 debt collection lawsuits for every consumer bankruptcy filing.
The result is a stark picture: bankruptcy is reaching only a fraction of those in deep financial distress, and the gap reflects structural exclusion, not stability. The conclusion calls for reimagining relief beyond bankruptcy, confronting debt as a public governance problem, and rebuilding collective provision.
Jiménez’s analysis should be a wake-up call for consumer bankruptcy attorneys. The “missing strugglers” are not avoiding relief because they are immune to debt collection pressure; they are caught in precisely the shame spirals described in Joe Gladstone's Financial Shame Spirals, convinced that filing for bankruptcy is a personal failure rather than a legal right. Ondersma’s Dignity, Not Debt reinforces that these shame dynamics are not incidental—they are cultivated by extractive credit systems that profit from keeping people in repayment purgatory for as long as possible.
This is also where David Graeber’s Debt: The First 5,000 Years is useful—not for doctrinal guidance, but for perspective. Debt has long been used to structure relationships of power, obligation, and subordination. What Jiménez documents is the modern American iteration of that ancient dynamic, in which relief is rationed, punishment is automated, and the moral narrative favors creditors.
Encouraging more of this population to access bankruptcy requires more than marketing—it demands systemic and cultural interventions:
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Proactive Outreach in Civil Courts – Partner with legal aid, pro bono programs, and court clerks to provide bankruptcy information to defendants in debt collection lawsuits. Handouts at first appearances or mediation sessions could frame bankruptcy as a tool, not a stigma.
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Medical and Social Service Partnerships – Many “missing strugglers” first encounter financial crises through hospitals, clinics, or social service agencies. Training frontline workers to identify potential bankruptcy candidates and refer them to reputable attorneys could intercept clients before default judgments pile up. That includes building partnerships between groups, including the Debt Collection Lab with whom Jimenez is working, and private consumer bankruptcy attorneys to find representation for debtors that is both affordable for consumers and provides reasonable compensation for the lawyers.
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Public Education Campaigns – Use local media, libraries, and community centers to demystify bankruptcy. Counter prevailing myths (“you lose everything,” “you’ll never get credit again”) with facts about exemptions, credit recovery, and the automatic stay.
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Fee Innovations – High upfront costs are a major barrier. Attorneys could offer sliding-scale retainers, bifurcated fee arrangements, or Chapter 13 “fee through the plan” options as ways to make bankruptcy financially accessible.
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Cultural Reframing – Borrow from the Debt Collective’s organizing model to normalize bankruptcy as an act of economic self-defense. If default and garnishment are seen as passive defeat, filing should be framed as taking control.
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Legislative and Rule Changes – Support reforms to streamline filing for low-asset debtors, expand exemptions, and reduce administrative burdens. Simplified forms and online filing could lower the entry threshold.
The “lawsuit-to-bankruptcy ratio” is not just a scholarly metric—it’s a practice tool. Attorneys can use it to identify high-need, low-filing communities and direct outreach accordingly. The more visible and accessible bankruptcy becomes—both in message and in method—the more likely these “missing strugglers” are to see it not as a last-resort defeat, but as a path to reset and rebuild.
Wild-Haired Suggestion:
Perhaps the most unintentionally revealing moment in Missing Strugglers is its pop culture citation—Chicago Med, Season 3, Episode 15 (“Devil in Disguise”)—where a patient drowning in medical debt has apparently never even heard of bankruptcy. If television shapes public consciousness, no wonder the “missing strugglers” stay missing.
The obvious corrective? A television procedural, equal parts heartstring-tugging drama and deadpan comedy, called “The Chapter.” Each week, our scrappy, overworked consumer bankruptcy attorneys would juggle eccentric clients (“Yes, sir, the court will still take your case even if you list your goldfish as a dependent”), relentless creditors, and the occasional heroic rescue of a family home. Plotlines would blend Law & Order’s case-of-the-week structure with Parks & Recreation-style office hijinks—except instead of catching criminals or building parks, our heroes halt garnishments, dodge means-test landmines, and negotiate reaffirmations with car lenders who “just need to talk to a manager.”
Season arc? The attorneys battle an evil, deep-pocketed debt buyer empire while educating America on exemptions, the automatic stay, and why “no, you don’t lose everything.” Viewers would laugh, cry, and—crucially—walk away knowing that bankruptcy is a real, legal option when debt is crushing them. In other words, The Chapter could do for debtor relief what CSI did for forensic science, except with fewer microscopes and more confirmation hearings.
All we need is a Los Angeles based law professor to pitch this to Netflix.
To read a copy of the transcript, please see:
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