New York Times: Service members left vulnerable to payday loans

Petty Officer First Class Vernaye Kelly winces when roughly $350 is automatically deducted from her Navy paycheck twice a month.

Month after month, the money goes to cover payments on loans with annual interest rates of nearly 40 percent. The monthly scramble — the scrimping, saving and going without — is a familiar one to her. More than a decade ago, she received her first payday loan to pay for moving expenses while her husband, a staff sergeant in the Marines, was deployed in Iraq.