Indentured Servitude

You don't want this status. Bad roots.

Think: feudal England wherein, every few years, the farmers who farmed the lands of the English Lord would have a bad season. They'd not be able to pay their tax. The Lord would float them a loan to buy seed and whatever for the next year. And the farmer would juuuust pay back that loan when a bad season would hit again. For generations.

In essence, the farmer was a servant of the Lord, indentured to the land by virtue of simply being in a bad industry, in a bad era to be...needy.