Posted by
Ike on Monday, March 02, 2009 12:46:14 PM
As we watch the stock market and the financial problems we face, we need to think about the causes as well as the solutions. The first cause comes out of Congress. Years back Congress pushed the financial industry to make loans to poorer people so that they could have a piece of the country. It sounded like a wonderful idea, as all government influence in the economy sounds till the unintended consequences catch up with reality. First unintended consequence was the need for cheap labor to build those houses. What we got was illegal aliens filling those jobs. Jobs that couldn't be done by American labor if we wanted to keep the houses cheap enough to give loans to the less afluent to buy. Next came the large home developers who saw a fortune to be made by using the cheap labor and selling, basicly to banks since the people buying didn't put money down. The banks then figured that, like the FHA, private bonds could be sold and they could continue buying houses. All of this might have gone on longer but for the price of oil. Yes, the price is now pushed up every time we turn on the presses and print more money, but not at first. The OPEC cartel is working hard to destroy the economic future of the west, just as Al Qada is working to destroy our faith in ourselves.