Synonym and Antonyms

Usury, the lending of money at relatively high rates to borrowers, is listed in Roget's 21st Century Thesaurus as follows:

Main Entry:	usury
Part of Speech:	noun
Definition:	lending money at a high interest rate
Synonyms:	exploitation, stealing (emphasis mine)

Apparently, time preferences are equivalent to criminal acts. A lending money to B at an interest rate above the market 'range' is immoral and exploitative.

This, of course, makes absolutely no sense. In the first place, it's hard to criticize a 'high' rate as such because that very rate is a component of the going market rate itself (assuming there is such a thing as a market rate). But of course, there is no uniform market rate, like there might be a uniform price for, say, Ramen Noodles or golf socks, because whereas these are uniform goods, the interest rate itself depends in large part upon the borrower of the money, and let us not forget that money borrowers are anything but homogeneous. Some borrowers have poorer credit histories than others; some need greater amounts of money than others; some need a specific amount of money longer than others, etc. Enter the interest rate, the price of borrowed funds, that approximates these varying circumstances. All else equal, those who are better at paying back borrowed funds can borrow money for cheaper; those with little or no collateral or equity to buffer against unforeseen losses find it more expensive to borrow money, etc.

With my example above, it's all too plain to see why 'usury' laws are completely ridiculous. In the unhampered market, what is considered an 'usury' rate is simply a rate that reflects competitive market conditions on the lender's side (monopoly position, etc.) and the borrower's relative risk-level. Usury laws that dictate how high of an interest rate can be charged on loans only serve to exclude market participants. Put simply, if you are a borrower such that the market determines your interest rate to be substantially higher than most other borrowers, the government steps in and makes it illegal to loan you money. End of story.

What struck me sour, though, was that the dictionary labels the equivalent of peaceful market exchange rates, however high as they may be, as exploitation, when it is the government and its usury laws that actually do the exploitation by excluding classes of borrowers from the starting line.