Tesh

Housing Rebound: Why It Could Take 20 Years

Why do we even bother with the silly metrics of "percent off the peak" when we talk of "recovery" of the housing market? The *peak* was an aberration, and getting back to sensible valuations *is* the recovery.

On Board the 'U.S.S. Titanic'

Nice article! The only trouble I have with it is the recommendation that the "middle class" keep pouring money into 401(k) sinkholes. That's still throwing good money after bad, feeding the Wall Street beast. We should be encouraging work and saving, not "investing".

Investing is not saving. That should be obvious as the markets slide into oblivion.

The Great Consumer Crash of 2009

With all the fuss over usury and the fraudulent economic system, I find it interesting that nobody is calling the investor society to task. The idea of "investing" your way to riches is just as dangerous and fundamentally unsound as fractional reserve lending. All that investing does is flip the debtor/creditor equation; usury is still a drain on capital, regardless of what direction it flows in.
The argument goes something like "screw the other guy more or earlier than he screws you", but bottom line, living on interest (usury) instead of production isn't a solid foundation for an economy.

Robert Shiller on America's 'Speculative Culture'

Life is risk. Living is speculation. That in and of itself isn't a terrible thing, since we learn from our mistakes. The trouble here is that speculators throughout the food chain want someone else (taxpayers, ultimately) to pay the consequences for their mistakes.

That's "moral hazard", and it is more akin to gambling (wanting something for nothing) than it is to living (honest work for honest pay, learning from mistakes and so on).

Thursday Outlook: The Inflation Con Game

The phrase is "the die is cast", which is to say, it has nothing to do with "dye". I thought that perhaps you meant to lead into a clever witticism about whitewashing the news or something, but it never showed up. Ah, well.

The Debt Bubble: What's Bernanke To Do?

"Cutting government spending slows the economy just like cutting consumer spending does"

Now that's just silly. Cutting wasteful government spending could well allow tax cuts without any ill effects. Billions of dollars are wasted in ill-advised government pet projects or in simple incompetence. Getting that tax money back in the hands of consumers would definitely not slow the economy.

Housing Market Tracker - Macro Outlook

It's still baffling to me that people want to keep housing prices high. The only people profiting from that are those corrupt dolts that caused the mess. Housing should not be a commodity, toyed with on Wall Street. Prices should come down, and arguing to keep them artificially high, whether via bailouts or rejiggering debt, is a fool's errand.

Tyler Cowen, Apologist for Fraud?

Blame can fit either party, borrower or lender... but ultimately, what should have been regulated was the lending system, not the borrowers. If the system wasn't corrupt to start with, "predatory borrowing" wouldn't be an option. (Except in rare cases of talented con people, but those would be rightly caught as fraud.)

Record Home Price Declines Portend Extended Downturn

One more symptom of the disease: The Rich Dad seminars are coming to Salt Lake City. Best to invest in get rich schemes now, while the money is flowing from California! Never mind that things will collapse within the next few years. You can be rich!

What gets me even more riled is that this sort of "investment" scheme is marketed specifically to people on the verge of retiring. It's carefully phrased as "make your money work for you", but it's all a scam, pure and simple. The only way to save money and build wealth is not to spend it. Investing is speculation, regardless of whether or not it's codified in Rich Dad terms or 401ks.

Record Home Price Declines Portend Extended Downturn

I knew we were screwed. The rats abandoning the sinking coast are wreaking havoc on Utah's economy, and have been for years. We may be the leader in current appreciation, but that only means we're the bag holders and knife catchers. The economic fundamentals no more support insane prices here than anywhere else. We just have a lot of idiots screwing up the system for us.

Keep your SIV issues and go home, California! Your ill-gotten gains and Ponzi schemes are not welcome!

Subprime Mess: No One's Fault But Our Own

Sure, a large portion of the blame lies with the greedy flipper or idiotic "investor", the status-sensitive socialite or the blind fool. Still, when a company sells something that is proven to be toxic, it needs to be held accountable as well. Drug pushers are just as much trouble as druggies.

I also agree with Renter; prices are so outlandishly stupid right now that "falling" prices are great news. They need to fall much more to get back to anything resembling sanity. I have no sympathy whatsoever for those who whine about house prices falling. It's called "correcting" to those who don't still hope for a greater fool.

U.S. Housing Numbers: Bad and Worsening

Indexes, performances, ROI, this is absurd. A house is not an investment, it's a place to live. House prices got stupid when people started gambling with them like stocks. Falling prices are not a sign of trouble, they are a sign of a market that's waking up to reality and trying to get through a bad hangover.