The Equity Dead Zones: Legal Intersectionality Failure Points in Chapter 13 Bankruptcy

Legal intersectionality failure points describe the systemic fractures that occur where overlapping legal, social, and economic inequalities converge, potentially producing compounded barriers to relief. Each failure point marks a site of marginalization. In what ways do individuals already recognized as vulnerable in Chapter 13 bankruptcy face a heightened risk when multiple forms of disadvantage intersect? When these intersections combine in mutually reinforcing ways—racial, economic, and relational disparities colliding with structural deficiencies in family, property, and bankruptcy law—does it result in pronounced negative outcomes, and, if so, what are those outcomes? Within this convergence, could there be a space where compounded marginalization so severely disadvantages individuals and families that traditional legal remedies, such as Chapter 13 bankruptcy, cease to function as meaningful relief? A research study was undertaken, to examine the impact of compounding marginalization on individual debtors in Chapter 13 bankruptcy through an extensive analysis of the interaction of these marginalizations. Barriers to relief that were examined in this study include financial hardships, racial disparities, emerging social responses to debt and instability, conflicts of law, particularly in the areas of contemporary issues in bankruptcy, such as gig work and substance abuse disorders, racial disparities, success metrics, access to legal assistance, and the framing of economic justice as a civil right.