First, there’s the obvious reason: It’s the sheer scale. The total value of the US residential market hovers around $20 trillion. There simply isn’t anything close to it (add up all the cars in the US—maybe 250 million—and give each an average value of $10,000 (8+ years median age), and you only get about $2.5 … Continued
Our financial crisis came about because of flawed thinking about how to help the poor. Financially sophisticated parents would never tell their children to borrow to the ceiling to buy a house or anything else. And yet, lawmakers thought that the way to help the poor was to encourage them to borrow heavily. The mass inducement … Continued
Read about: What Happened to the U.S. Housing Market? As the U.S. financial system struggles to regain stability, Peggy Crawford, PhD, and Terri Young, PhD, examine the role that subprime mortgages and the fall of Fannie and Freddie played in the crisis. Peggy Crawford, PhD, and Terri Young, PhD U.S. Could Adopt International Financial Reporting … Continued
The United States is facing the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression. Financial institutions are failing, as is confidence in the financial system. U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson have testified that Congress must act immediately to bail out troubled financial institutions, or we could face a financial … Continued
Intelligent people, including my wife, have been asking me questions about the subprime mortgage crisis. The point that seems to stump them is why a relatively small percentage of subprime mortgage defaults has led to a spiraling national credit crisis, how it happened, and where do we go from here. They were good questions, and … Continued