debtor's prison
Jail for owing
A debtor's prison was a jail where people were confined for failing to pay debts—a practice largely abolished in Western countries by the 19th century.
The term now appears mainly in historical contexts or as a rhetorical warning against harsh treatment of debtors: Critics say aggressive student loan collection creates a modern debtor's prison.
- peonageDebt-based forced labor
- debtMoney owed another
- unpaid billsAmounts not yet remitted
- debt trapSelf-perpetuating financial burden
- cellBasic unit of life
human dignity · debt bondage · incarceration · chains · ball and chain · solitary confinement · gaol · Charles Dickens · penal colony · forced labor · indentured servitude · imprisonment · economic inequality · access to justice · abolition movement · poor laws · vagrancy laws · dungeon
- imprisonmentjail, prisoners, cells, captivity, dungeons
- historical lawattainder, Justinian Code, Roman law, curtesy, Napoleonic Code
- penal historyprisons, gaols, jails, penitentiaries, convict
- punishmentsjail, timeout, grounded, fine, suspension
- Victorian institutionsworkhouse, poorhouse, almshouse, lunatic asylum, infirmary
- English Lawbarristers, solicitors, solicitor, High Court, Crown Court
debtor's prisonpenitentiary
Facility for convicted criminals
maximum security prison · federal prison · correctional facility · gulag · reformatory
debtor's prisondebt forgiveness
Cancellation of amounts owed
bankruptcy protection · debt relief · jubilee · debt cancellation · clean slate