Journal Article

Household Debts: Global Experience of Restructuring Debts and Ukrainian Reality

Kornіvska Valerіa O., Yaremenko Oleh L.

2021

Overview

The research results on the global problem of household debt growth, its causes, consequences, social context, and influence on the formation of aggregate demand are presented. It is substantiated that with the growth of debts, households are losing their share in aggregate demand, and the state is becoming an increasingly influential player compared to others due to the strengthening of fiscal and regulatory government influence. Facing the increasing debt pressure, households start reducing consumption, thus negatively affecting aggregate demand. The government, on its part, trying to improve the situation, increases subsidies and provides policies that encourage banks to restructure loans, develops restructuring programs, etc. These trends are proven to be of an urgent character and should not be routinized, in order not to distort the market environment or increase the direct influence of the state on purely market processes. The analysis of global experience, carried out in the article, shows that in the condition of economic destabilization debt restructuring is the only way to help the population out of the debt trap. Special attention is paid to the analysis of the ways to harmonize the accumulation of household debt through restructuring, to identify its market mechanisms, and to prove that the state should provide extensive assistance to households trying to overcome the debt trap. Three options for the state participation in the restructuring process have been identified: institutional participation (when the state only provides regulatory support); design and implementation of state restructuring programs; adoption of regulations on compulsory restructuring. New Ukrainian norms and regulations related to forced debt restructuring are analyzed, and their social context is proved to be contradictory. On the one hand, the adoption of corresponding laws became a significant step towards maintaining the social stability of the Ukrainian population against the background of the growing poverty and increasing total indebtedness of the people (even in the sphere of payments for public utility services), and the growing currency risks. On the other hand, Ukrainian market players often show moral hazards of non-compliance with the conditions of debt discipline, which have become part of the financial behavior, negatively affecting the general financial culture.

• Publisher: PH \"INZHEK\"
• Subject: debt restructuring / forced debt restructuring / household debts / state restructuring programs