Rising rates of consumer bankruptcy will come under in the spotlight in a new University of Queensland study.
Dr David Morrison, from UQ's TC Beirne School of Law, has secured an Australian Research Council Grant for his project: "A Consumer Bankruptcy Project — an interdisciplinary empiric inquiry into determinants and impacts of bankruptcy upon Australian debtors".
Dr Morrison is the only law academic in Australia to be awarded a 2009 ARC Linkage International Fellowship.
He will collaborate with bankruptcy scholars in the US conducting interdisciplinary empiric research around consumer bankruptcy. Dr Morrison will join the collaborative effort with academics from universities including Illinois, Harvard, Texas at Austin, and Michigan.
The collaboration is gathering important data from US personal bankruptcies and conducts interdisciplinary research around topics including debt and health, reckless consumer lending, labour force demographics, economic marginality, small business impact and the financial well-being of families.
"There is a real need both in the current economic uncertainty and looking forward to the future to understand reasons for financial distress and the consequential rising rates of bankruptcy in Australia," Dr Morrison said.
"The project will look at the wellbeing of Australian society by obtaining a better understanding of the profile of bankrupt debtors, the reasons for personal default and the impact of the regulatory framework upon all stakeholders.
"The research project fills a gap in Australian literature by conducting independent research around both traditional and emerging means of dealing with personal financial difficulty and by participating in US research to enable jurisdictional comparison," he said.
"The research is of critical importance because of the lack of independent research being conducted in Australia around bankruptcy.
"It will lead to an informed debate around critical wider issues such as financial literacy, managing money and self funded retirement – important factors impacting upon the well-being of all Australians."
Dr Morrison said he was confident that in gathering and understanding data around bankruptcy, the project would promote improvement in financial literacy within Australia.
It would also assist in the reduction of financial distress and dependence, an important target for all countries seeking to bear the economic risks associated with an ageing population.
Understanding factors and the impact of personal bankruptcy will inform other research Dr Morrison is currently undertaking via an ARC Linkage Project on the asset management of aged persons in Australia.
Media: Ms Tina Vasiljevic, Communications and External Relations Officer, TC Beirne School of Law
The University of Queensland t.vaslijevic@law.uq.edu.au
phone 07 3346 9350
