Editorial: On payday loans, diesel prices and coal subsidies

The Ohio Senate did the right thing last week in approving a bill to restrict the payday lending industry in Ohio. The new law would limit borrowers to four short-term loans a year and cap annual interest rates at 28 percent. The bill now goes to the Ohio House of Representatives. House Speaker John Justed and Gov. Ted Strickland both say they support the measure, so it likely will become law.

Industry spokesmen say the law would effectively shut down their operations in Ohio, costing about 2,200 people their jobs. If so, too bad. An industry that charges people 391 percent annual interest would be hard put to find sympathy in Ohio or any other state. Payday lending may work for some people, but for others it becomes a trap that they can't get out of.

Payday lending, problems in the subprime mortgage market and the number of consumers carrying large balances on high-interest credit cards show regulation of lending businesses has gotten off track. We have to start somewhere to get things back on the right track, and payday lending is the best place to do that.

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If gasoline prices are regulated by the law of supply and demand, there may be little relief in store for people planning long trips by car.

A story in the Wall Street Journal last week said U.S. refiners normally would be increasing their production of gasoline at this point in May, but instead they are producing as much diesel fuel as they can. Diesel fuel is more profitable right now. People are cutting back their purchases of gasoline, and refiners have not been able to increase gasoline prices to match the price increases in crude oil, according to the Journal.

This sounds like a good time for state and local tourism authorities to promote close-to-home vacations and day trips.

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Kentucky's coal industry is getting about $400,000 a year in state tax dollars for educational materials that promote mining, including funding for public campaigns promoting the controversial practice of mountaintop removal, according to the Lexington Herald-Leader. The materials are used mostly for statewide classroom programs and includes teaching materials and games.

Environmentalists said the coal industry should be paying for its own public relations campaigns. That sounds right. And the state education department should ask if it really wants its schools to become a battleground in the mountaintop removal mining debate.