lalong wrote:The republicans would have us believe that the wealthy simply throw cash to the wind. Contrary the Democrats seem to think if you took money from the rich, the poor would somehow benefit. The blatant fact is they are raping us while they can, buying time as they circle the wagons. We are running towards a point of no possible return and every answer given, is that we will somehow eventually spend our way into prosperity. We just need to run faster.
I agree a large amount of the wealthy supported small business, but a larger part of small business was from when homes were worth at least what you bought them for. Over the years with accumulated equity paid into them, you could take out a loan against that, for a small business, or a better education. The top job providers in our country are businesses that employ less than ten people. Accounting for about half the GDP and over half of the employment for the US. Think about how many friends and neighbors you know personally, that did exactly what I’m talking about. Were they billionaires, millionaires?
The people who’s dream was to own their own hair salon, deli, restaurant, gas station, that’s all those homeowners with enough equity left over, to take a reasonable risk and not lose everything if it failed. Tragic yes, homeless no. So if anyone on the hill had an ounce of sincerity when they spout on about “small business”, the very next thing out of their mouth should be home values, not jobs, not taxes, not green technologies. Because fifty percent of everything else, eventually derives from the pool that hasn’t only gone dry, but is sucking up everything of value around it.
Of course if you bought a home you couldn’t afford, for the purpose of high risk investment. You should by all means lose your shirt and the banks that lent you that money should have eaten it. But for anyone else that purchased a home with a conservative thirty or twenty year mortgage, on a property that appraised more than the purchase price? How about those folks? The immediate response was to prop up the banks. In effect our government will use our tax money to reposes homes from taxpayers, to pay back the banks. They have invested our future in doing just that, not in helping the individual homeowners. That would have paid the banks too, from the bottom up.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/29/obama-foreclosure-hamp-cbo_n_789559.html
“The Obama administration will spend less than a quarter of the $50 billion it promised to help homeowners facing foreclosure, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said in a report Monday.”
If fifty percent of our GDP and employment is reliant on businesses that employ ten or less people and small business loans dependant on equity.. where is the equity? The estimate will be one million homes in foreclosure for 2010.
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-04-12/profit-for-banks-dimmed-by-home-equity-loss-seen-at-30-billion.html
In contrast the banks are posting low profits because: “There’s very little recovery for home-equity loans,” Of course not, because when they fell behind in payments you were to friggin busy raping them for every penny and selling the empty shell for cents on the dollar.
Read that again low profits, not losses. Every bank out there that required federal bailout, should be posting a profit of exactly $0. Until them and our government can afford to buy back to the amount of the entire “stimulus”, every home financed through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac guidelines in foreclosure. Since those were the government supported institutions dictating the rules on acceptable risk. Those homes should be rented to the purchaser at their current appraised value, until a recovery of at least 80% of their original purchase price.
I’m not saying give them the homes here, just give them a chance at recovery rather than toss them out into the street. When these folks fell behind, the banks thought nothing of outright extortionate fees to recover losses and shake them down of any possible hope of recovery. And dammit I want at least six percent interest on every cent those banks will be paying back. As if "we the people" would ever see that money again.
Personally I don’t think they want a recovery, but a collapse. I wonder how much gold Obama has in his portfolio?
Kudos Lalong. I hope more figure it out. You are bringing out some GOOD IDEAS.
