GSlusher

Looking at the Market and Three Tech Stocks - Dell, Apple and IBM

Re: paying off other people's mortgages

You've been doing that for many, many years. What, you say? Yes. It's called "deducting mortgage interest." That's a taxpayer subsidy to homeowners. As far as I know, no other type of consumer debt has deductible interest. (Quite a while ago, one could deduct interest on car loans, etc.) This is why people get second mortgages and lines of credit to buy cars, send kids to college, etc., and one reason some people are now under water.

Of course, this subsidy is worth more to high-income taxpayers because of their higher marginal rates.