Let me address a common misconception that all debt collectors own the debt they’re trying to collect.

Before I do that, however, I’d like to start with how my recent columns on debt collection began. I received a letter from an entrepreneur who had fallen on hard times but had recovered financially. She wanted to know if she should pay an old credit card debt in full. She owed $24,000 but a collection agency was offering to settle it for $14,000. She wanted to pay the entire debt to clear her conscience.

I said go with your conscience. And she did. She paid the $24,000.

Many people wrote to me, stunned that I would recommend such a thing. They argued that the debt collector was a third party who bought the original debt as a business investment and therefore the woman shouldn’t feel obligated to repay the full amount.

In other words, these writers considered this woman a chump. I couldn’t help but wonder why.

Of course, on reflection, I do know why. We’ve become a society so used to the system playing us that we feel justified in playing the system.

We ask ourselves, why play fair if corporate America doesn’t? It becomes easy to argue that if a company bought our debt for pennies on the dollar, why should we pay more than that?

There are two reasons why it matters. First, you are morally obligated. You contracted the debt, and the deal your creditor cuts to get that money shouldn’t be your concern.

Second, creditors are not playing as many games as you think.

There are basically two types of debt collectors: those who work on commission and get a percentage of the debt they collect, and those who purchase the debt at a discount. The overwhelming majority of collection agencies are working on a commission and are collecting debt on behalf of the borrower’s creditor.

Without question, the penalties, interest and fees on some debt can be monstrous and immoral. But this is more about our collective feelings about the companies charged with collecting debt. Let’s say you’re buying a home and you find out the seller paid an incredibly low price for it. Would you argue that the homeowner shouldn’t get the fair-market asking price?

This same principle applies to legitimate and legal debt collection efforts. It is none of your business what a debt purchaser paid for your debt. And it certainly is none of your business what commission a debt collector is getting to collect on money you clearly and morally owe.