Occupy Wall Street

[UpstateNYUPSer(Ret)]

Looks like a little bit of snow is not going to deter the protesters.

 

[pickup]

If you google "Federal Reserve Maiden Lane", the results page will have a little map of where the bank is and Zuccotti Park is just a stone's throw away. The protestors seem to be focused onto getting onto Wall Street. If they pointed themselves towards the Federal Reserve Building and marched over there, they would be a lot closer to the bullseye. Of course, that is when they would get beat up by the police because they(the protestors) would indeed be focusing on the the more direct cause of this whole mess. As long as the protestors ignore the man behind the curtain, these protests will be allowed to continue.

End transmission.......

 

[FracusBrown]

It was those who "understand the basics of our economy" that drove it in the ditch in the first place. The thing that pisses people off is that they knew that their gambles would be covered by government. So tell me was it really an entrepreneurial risk if they knew they would be bailed out??

Who is saying they want a society of poor people?? Certainly no one of OWS!! They agree with the 70% of americans who also believe that the wealth should be better distributed (latest NYT/CBS poll). I guess there is lots of incentive to "work" (gamble on currencies and securitized mortgages) when you know the outcome!!

Corporations are also allowed to exist by the power of the state. And if that state decides that the corporation no longer benefits the interests of its citizens, that state has a right to terminate that corporation. Remember corporations were created to serve society, not the other way around!!

You are absolutely correct. It was those buying $600,000 homes on a income that can only support a $100,000 home that lead to the crash. Clearly these people didn't understand basic economics. We can blame it on the banks, the corporations or even the government. Personal responsibly has a role in each of our fates.

Of course 70% want more of someone else's income. These 70% are better than most of the worlds population. When you put the shoe on the other foot, how much of their wealth are they willing to redistribute to the less fortunate? None is the most likely answer. Do you think your income should be better divided with the part-timers?


I guess it can be said that corporations are intended to serve society, but a more reasonable explanation is that corporations are intended to drive investment to grow the economy without placing the investors in a situation of unreasonable risk. Without this, people would simply put their money under their mattress. By risking their wealth, they stimulate the economy by creating companies that employ others. Microsoft (for example) made a lot of people rich, and in the process provided employment to countless others. Without the initial investment in this corporation society would not be better off and without the corporation the immense tax revenues generated (corporate and employee generated) would not exist.

 

[804brown]

You are absolutely correct. It was those buying $600,000 homes on a income that can only support a $100,000 home that lead to the crash. Clearly these people didn't understand basic economics. We can blame it on the banks, the corporations or even the government. Personal responsibly has a role in each of our fates.

Of course 70% want more of someone else's income. These 70% are better than most of the worlds population. When you put the shoe on the other foot, how much of their wealth are they willing to redistribute to the less fortunate? None is the most likely answer. Do you think your income should be better divided with the part-timers?


I guess it can be said that corporations are intended to serve society, but a more reasonable explanation is that corporations are intended to drive investment to grow the economy without placing the investors in a situation of unreasonable risk. Without this, people would simply put their money under their mattress. By risking their wealth, they stimulate the economy by creating companies that employ others. Microsoft (for example) made a lot of people rich, and in the process provided employment to countless others. Without the initial investment in this corporation society would not be better off and without the corporation the immense tax revenues generated (corporate and employee generated) would not exist.

Still blaming the victims?? It was the banking industry that lobbied to make it easier for them to lend more people $$. It is the responsibility of the brokers and the bankers and regulators to decide if a couple can afford a certain home. People want to own their own homes. But when rapacious brokers and bankers knowingly ok a loan to someone they know cannot afford it, who's fault is it?? Especially when they know that their faulty deal will be covered up in securitzed other loans in the market. You continue to blame people who got hoodwinked into thinking they could afford those homes, people who do not know economics that well.

 

[FracusBrown]

Still blaming the victims?? It was the banking industry that lobbied to make it easier for them to lend more people $$. It is the responsibility of the brokers and the bankers and regulators to decide if a couple can afford a certain home. People want to own their own homes. But when rapacious brokers and bankers knowingly ok a loan to someone they know cannot afford it, who's fault is it?? Especially when they know that their faulty deal will be covered up in securitzed other loans in the market. You continue to blame people who got hoodwinked into thinking they could afford those homes, people who do not know economics that well.

You have your facts mixed up. Acorn and the dems lobbied for allowing loans to the former unqualified borrowers. They forced lenders to participate. The community reinvestment act (CRA) started the whole mess.


"The goal of the community groups was to force Fannie and Freddie to loosen their underwriting standards, in order to facilitate the purchase of loans made under the CRA. Thus a provision was inserted into the law whereby Congress signaled to the GSEs that they should accept down payments of 5% or less, ignore impaired credit if the blot was over one year old, and otherwise loosen their lending guidelines."


"The result of loosened credit standards and a mandate to facilitate affordable-housing loans was a tsunami of high risk lending that sank the GSEs, overwhelmed the housing finance system, and caused an expected $1 trillion in mortgage loan losses by the GSEs, banks, and other investors and guarantors, and most tragically an expected 10 million or more home foreclosures.
As a result of congressional and regulatory actions, the percentage of conventional first mortgages (not guaranteed by the Federal Housing Administration or the Veteran's Administration) used to purchase a home with the borrower putting 5% or less down tripled from 9% in 1991 to 27% in 1995, eventually reaching 29% in 2007."
Edward Pinto: Acorn and the Housing Bubble - WSJ.com

 

[804brown]

You have your facts mixed up. Acorn and the dems lobbied for allowing loans to the former unqualified borrowers. They forced lenders to participate. The community reinvestment act (CRA) started the whole mess.


"The goal of the community groups was to force Fannie and Freddie to loosen their underwriting standards, in order to facilitate the purchase of loans made under the CRA. Thus a provision was inserted into the law whereby Congress signaled to the GSEs that they should accept down payments of 5% or less, ignore impaired credit if the blot was over one year old, and otherwise loosen their lending guidelines."


"The result of loosened credit standards and a mandate to facilitate affordable-housing loans was a tsunami of high risk lending that sank the GSEs, overwhelmed the housing finance system, and caused an expected $1 trillion in mortgage loan losses by the GSEs, banks, and other investors and guarantors, and most tragically an expected 10 million or more home foreclosures.
As a result of congressional and regulatory actions, the percentage of conventional first mortgages (not guaranteed by the Federal Housing Administration or the Veteran's Administration) used to purchase a home with the borrower putting 5% or less down tripled from 9% in 1991 to 27% in 1995, eventually reaching 29% in 2007."
Edward Pinto: Acorn and the Housing Bubble - WSJ.com

Why do you far righties still blame the CRA. Again it was created in 1977 to stop lending descrimination. It has been updated over the years. Acorn ?? LOL Oh yeah im sure they were for people who have been descriminated against but certainly no one wanted unqualified people from getting loans. But Acorn did not force anyone to give anyone a loan. The updated CRA which was lobbied for by the banking industry, only ended some old redlining practices. NOt the dems nor the advocates for the working poor forced any bank to make a loan!! The responsibility was with the banks themselves to see if these new customers were worthy of a loan. Again, stop blaming the victims!!

 

[wkmac]

You have your facts mixed up. Acorn and the dems lobbied for allowing loans to the former unqualified borrowers. They forced lenders to participate. The community reinvestment act (CRA) started the whole mess.


"The goal of the community groups was to force Fannie and Freddie to loosen their underwriting standards, in order to facilitate the purchase of loans made under the CRA. Thus a provision was inserted into the law whereby Congress signaled to the GSEs that they should accept down payments of 5% or less, ignore impaired credit if the blot was over one year old, and otherwise loosen their lending guidelines."


"The result of loosened credit standards and a mandate to facilitate affordable-housing loans was a tsunami of high risk lending that sank the GSEs, overwhelmed the housing finance system, and caused an expected $1 trillion in mortgage loan losses by the GSEs, banks, and other investors and guarantors, and most tragically an expected 10 million or more home foreclosures.
As a result of congressional and regulatory actions, the percentage of conventional first mortgages (not guaranteed by the Federal Housing Administration or the Veteran's Administration) used to purchase a home with the borrower putting 5% or less down tripled from 9% in 1991 to 27% in 1995, eventually reaching 29% in 2007."
Edward Pinto: Acorn and the Housing Bubble - WSJ.com

Fracus,

You are correct to blame one side of the statist construct but I have reason to question just how deeply you have looked into the entire mortgage bubble. To frame this whole thing only on democrats while ignoring republican bloody hands too IMO gives you ZERO credibility in this discussion. Just another mindless shrill who brings nothing to the table, especially in the way of honesty!

I await your statist red-state talking points in reply.

I love a good laugh!

 

[FracusBrown]

Fracus,

You are correct to blame one side of the statist construct but I have reason to question just how deeply you have looked into the entire mortgage bubble. To frame this whole thing only on democrats while ignoring republican bloody hands too IMO gives you ZERO credibility in this discussion. Just another mindless shrill who brings nothing to the table, especially in the way of honesty!

I await your statist red-state talking points in reply.

I love a good laugh!

Mindless shrill, zero credibility, honesty...pretty strong words.

I really could care less which side(s) were involved. If you have something of substance to offer to support the "bloody hands" or to dispute the role of the CRA, serve it up. I'm open to the facts.

Loosened regulations and guidelines allowed loans to be made to poorly qualified buyers. Poorly qualified buyers purchased more than they could afford. Many profited and many lost. Everyone was going along while the going was good. All the name calling and harsh words you can muster won't change the facts.

 

[804brown]

Mindless shrill, zero credibility, honesty...pretty strong words.

I really could care less which side(s) were involved. If you have something of substance to offer to support the "bloody hands" or to dispute the role of the CRA, serve it up. I'm open to the facts.

Loosened regulations and guidelines allowed loans to be made to poorly qualified buyers. Poorly qualified buyers purchased more than they could afford. Many profited and many lost. Everyone was going along while the going was good. All the name calling and harsh words you can muster won't change the facts.

You just said it: "loosened regulation"!! But again poorly qualified people would not get those loans if responsible people (the ones who have the power to say yes or no) did their jobs. And responsible people (the bankers) didnt securitize all the known bad loans that infected everything!!

 

[moreluck]

What if the bankers were told by the gov't....you better give these loans or else ???

 

[804brown]

What if the bankers were told by the gov't....you better give these loans or else ???

Nonsense. It is obvious you do not know how our government works. Tha banking lobbyists contribute to our political class and in return they get legislation that fattens their bottom lines. It is a great investment. Works everytime!!

 

[Babagounj]

Via The People’s Cube,

 

[bbsam]

What if the bankers were told by the gov't....you better give these loans or else ???

Are you saying that the banks, knowing they could sell off the mortgage in securities, gave a damn whether the home owner could pay it back? Why? They were getting paid at closing and passing the risk on.

 

[wkmac]

Mindless shrill, zero credibility, honesty...pretty strong words.

I really could care less which side(s) were involved. If you have something of substance to offer to support the "bloody hands" or to dispute the role of the CRA, serve it up. I'm open to the facts.

Loosened regulations and guidelines allowed loans to be made to poorly qualified buyers. Poorly qualified buyers purchased more than they could afford. Many profited and many lost. Everyone was going along while the going was good. All the name calling and harsh words you can muster won't change the facts.

Go to the red lettered embedded link in my post and start from there. You can also just ignore "The Awful Truths About Republicans" (another red letter embedded link) but I'll leave that up to you.

 

[wkmac]

Are you saying that the banks, knowing they could sell off the mortgage in securities, gave a damn whether the home owner could pay it back? Why? They were getting paid at closing and passing the risk on.

Good point. This was a situation where both the gov't and the friend.I.R.E. industry was rolling in the good life and the worse part is much or most of the risk was or either would be put on the taxpayer at the end of the day. Most recently Bank of America moved derivatives out from Merrill Lynch and into a deposit taking unit which ultimately can put taxpayers on the hook to cover the risk. Mussolini would be proud that we've abandon classical liberal market traditions and adapted a gov't form of his corporatism once called fascism. Great job democrats and republicans!

 

[Jones]

What if the bankers were told by the gov't....you better give these loans or else ???

You do realize that it was the banking industry that lobbied so hard for those burdensome regulations to be lifted specifically so that they could make those loans, right?

 

[brett636]

You do realize that it was the banking industry that lobbied so hard for those burdensome regulations to be lifted specifically so that they could make those loans, right?

That would be wrong. It was the federal government telling the banks they will make those loans or else. Through legislation such as the Community reinvestment act and the power the government has through its GSE's or government sponsored enterprises such as fannie and freddie they pretty much forced the bank's hand to make loans to people who could not otherwise qualify for them. Why do you think the government was so quick to prop up the private banks when their house of cards fell? Because they did not want their bad policy to become the center issue here which is exactly what it was.

 

[Jones]

That would be wrong. It was the federal government telling the banks they will make those loans or else. Through legislation such as the Community reinvestment act and the power the government has through its GSE's or government sponsored enterprises such as fannie and freddie they pretty much forced the bank's hand to make loans to people who could not otherwise qualify for them. Why do you think the government was so quick to prop up the private banks when their house of cards fell? Because they did not want their bad policy to become the center issue here which is exactly what it was.

Cite me some specific instances of this happening, and further demonstrate that it happened on a large enough scale to cause the housing crisis.

 

[brett636]

John Stossel on 2020 Explains The Mortgage Meltdown. - YouTube

 

[Jones]

John Stossel on 2020 Explains The Mortgage Meltdown. - YouTube

Nowhere in that video does anyone give any specifics to back up your claim that "It was the federal government telling the banks they will make those loans or else."

You state that the government used legislation like the Community Reinvestment Act, but a study conducted in 2003 found no evidence that it increased home buying in low income areas more than home buying in high income areas. click

A further study in 2008 by the CEI pinned the blame squarely where it belongs:

Moreover, the combination of dramatic advances in information technologies and
deregulation throughout the 1980s and 1990s created a highly competitive market that
virtually guaranteed the availability of credit to anybody who sought it. Three major
pieces of legislation that removed regulatory barriers for the banking industry included:
• Depository Deregulation and Monetary Control Act of 1980. Allowed
institutions to charge any interest rates they chose.
• Reigle-Neal Interstate Banking and Branching Efficiency Act of 1994. Allowed
banks to operate across state lines.
• Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999. Allowed banks to engage in previously
prohibited activities such as lending, depositing, issuing insurance, and financial
advising.

click