mortgage crisis

Principal Reductions are Needed!

It was neo-liberal policies that created this mess and it will take progressive policies to fix it. There are several reasons why we have not seen progressive policies from Democrats: 1) They are owned by Wall Street and 2) Such policies require a shared sacrifice (which has been absent for quite some time) or the financial oligarchy to experience some pain. We have seen nothing but policies that support the financial sector. That will have to change if we are to move forward.

The mortgage crisis that triggered our economic crisis or Great Recession was created by a lack of regulation and increased financialization. But we have failed to address the underlying problems of the mortgage crisis. In fact, most programs intended to address the mortgage crisis have failed miserably.

Are Financial Conglomerates in a Position to Lend?

Are financial conglomerates in a position to increase lending? Do they still have too many "toxic assets" on the books plus a lot of their own debt on the books which in turn is causing them to not be able to provide any no loans? Are we (households) in a position to incur more debt? If the trillions of dollars that Federal Reserve and Treasury pumped into the financial system to keep interest rates low is not jump starting new lending, did we just waste trillions of dollars? These are the questions that came to mind after reading this Bloomberg article and the Federal Reserve Bank's April 2009 Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey.