Bits Bucket For December 3, 2010
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The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
December 3, 2010
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Fed Created Conflicts in Improvising $3.3 Trillion Financial System Rescue
By Bob Ivry, Christine Richard and Christopher Condon - Dec 2, 2010 9:01 PM PT
Fed’s Lending Fueled Cronyism Or Saved U.S. Economy
A recreational vehicle owned by Deborah A. Cunningham, chief investment officer of Federated Investments Inc., stands at Beaver Stadium in State College, Pennsylvania. Source: Deborah A. Cunningham via Bloomberg
Deborah A. Cunningham, the manager of $261 billion at Federated Investors Inc., was squeezed into the bathroom of her family’s recreational vehicle, trying to help save the $3.6 trillion money market industry.
Cunningham was on the phone with Federal Reserve officials in Boston, New York and Washington. Outside, in the Pennsylvania State University stadium parking lot in State College, football fans were preparing for a game against Temple University.
“It was the only place I could hear,” Cunningham said. “People were drinking beer. They kept knocking on the door, saying, ‘I have to go.’”
The solution Cunningham helped craft on Sept. 20, 2008, was a bailout for money market funds, which were created as safe investments that could be easily cashed out. The Fed put the facility into effect two days later. At its peak in October 2008, it provided $152 billion to stem a customer run sparked by the Sept. 15 bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.
This week’s disclosures of data from the Fed’s rescue efforts during the 2007-2008 financial crisis show how the central bank employed companies to help design or run programs they could use to their benefit. Federated tapped the money- market rescue for $8.89 billion, according to Fed data. Pacific Investment Management Co. and BlackRock Inc. weren’t only advisers to the Fed, they were also trading securities they helped value, the Fed data show.
No Choice
“That’s the way the system works,” said David Castillo, senior managing director at Further Lane Securities in San Francisco. “It’s problematic that they’re customers, but that shouldn’t limit their ability to participate in this process. Quite frankly, we don’t have a choice. They have the expertise.”
…
“No Choice….that’s the way the system works..”
The system sucks. Pull your money out of Wall Street if you can. The major banks as well. Use your local credit union.
We need to starve this beast. Let’s help bring this drama to it’s natural conclusion.
“No Choice….that’s the way the system works…”
That is a catch-all lame excuse if ever there was one.
Here are a few more:
1. No one could have seen it coming.
2. We had to do it to save the world from another Great Depression.
3. These financial institutions were so large and interconnected that they posed systemic risk to the entire global financial system. If they had been allowed to fail, the world’s financial system would have collapsed.
“systemic-risk” -any law can be broken if systemic risk is at stake: Fraud, Bribery, Forgery, Counterfeitting, Murder, Gravity.
These financial institutions were so large and interconnected that they posed systemic risk to the entire global financial system. If they had been allowed to fail, the world’s financial system would have collapsed.
If this is true, and nothing is done about it, this society is willfully allowing this sector to hold the country hostage.
A very, very lucrative hostage.
“Use your local credit union.”
My CU is offering auto and home loans for marginal credit scores and a 90 day no payment grace period. Thank goodness it’s just my operating funds in there.
They talk a conservative game, but were doing 125% LTV’s during the bubble.
Mine wasn’t. They were picky about credit scores and I think they most they did on mortgages was 90% LTV.
In Colorado
Apparently you’re with a “real” CU. It kept to conservative, sensible guidelines.
awaiting wipeout,
What unfortunately happened in altogether too many cases was they were over run by banking-types that felt the CU’s were being “conservative to the point of a fault!” and then set about “working their magic”.
<i.What unfortunately happened in altogether too many cases was they were over run by banking-types that felt the CU’s were being “conservative to the point of a fault!” and then set about “working their magic”.
We had a local CU (Norlarco) that was financing rez construction in Florida. Needless to say Norlarco was seized.
My CU pays me 0.01% interest on my checking account.
Steve J,
One ‘could’ have taken the cake by saying; “Yeah, my credit union was paying me 0.01% interest ( that was before the banking-types “worked their magic” and got it SEIZED!” ) ?
“My CU pays me 0.01% interest on my checking account.”
You can always buy long-term Treasurys. I believe they are currently yielding around 3.00 percent interest.
You place your principal in much greater risk with long term bonds. How much is your 3% long term treasury going to be worth if interest rates for similarly termed bonds rise to 3.25%? 3.5%? 4%?
.01% on a checking account really stinks, but at least the principal is not at risk. Not so with long term treasuries.
.01% on a checking account really stinks, but at least the principal is not at interest rate risk. Not so with long term treasuries.
The principal is still at risk. You have heard of Weimar Germany, I assume?
“You place your principal in much greater risk with long term bonds.”
Even with QE2, QE3, QE4, etc on the way?
Of course, if the Fed leadership changes its mind, and stops propping up Treasury bond prices (buy suppressing yields), tough rocks!
The question I keep coming back to is, even if the Fed currently seems committed to keeping the lid on long-term Treasury bond yields, is there anything outside their control that could force their hand to prevent them from continuing with the yield suppression regime they currently support?
The question I keep coming back to is, even if the Fed currently seems committed to keeping the lid on long-term Treasury bond yields, is there anything outside their control that could force their hand to prevent them from continuing with the yield suppression regime they currently support?
Yes: the collapse of the foreign exchange value of the dollar would do it.
“Yes: the collapse of the foreign exchange value of the dollar would do it.”
Sure, but have you noticed how hard the Fed has struggled as of late to suppress the FOREX value of the dollar? Unless I am missing it, it seems like the trend is going the exact opposite direction from your dollar collapse scenario.
Combo — do you wanna weigh in here?
Wasn’t too long ago that *my* credit union threw HELOC parties in the lobby. Complete with popcorn.
And being a good HBB-er, I couldn’t help thinking about “Got popcorn?” Neil.
My credit union heavily promotes boob job, I mean “personal improvement” loans, which annoys me to no end. Not much different than the eye doctors marketing botox. Conflict of interest much?
Who is to say how often boob jobs pay for the full principle balance and interest payments on a “personal improvement” loan?
“pay for the full principle balance and interest payments”
Paging Freakanometricians…
What happens when they default? Do repo-men come out to take ‘em back?
Lipo-men?
Any job openings?
I’ve switched to a local bank, but how can I pull my money out of Wall Street? I have 25 years until I retire, I’m not counting on Social Security and even Medicare is dicey. I don’t trust my mattress: whatever Combo says, I can’t count on 25 years of deflation either. Where else do I get anything resembling a return? Treasuries, maybe?
The way the housing bubble and economy is shaking out, I don’t want to buy a house that’s even 1.5 times my income, never mind 2.5. I might be throwing my cash in the trash until I retire and can move from the region Where The Jobs Are to Podunk.
I’m starting to think that the best place for my cash is goodies from Wal-Mart, vacations and good food and wine. That might bring a better return in memory value than anything else out there.
OK oxide, I’m not a financial advisor. But ten years ago the stock market was through the roof and I kept our retirement in stock mutual funds, then watched it fall 70%. If you have kept your retirement in stocks up to now, you have done well. But please at least think about protecting it temporarily until the economy has a chance to recover.
Are you eligible for the Thrift Savings Plan? They have a G fund that seems to guarantee the returns of a long term bond (4%). If I had that available to me it would be a no-brainer.
REhobbyist,
Therein lies the paradox huh? When you ( selfishly! ) live “Where The Jobs Are” your cost-of-living precludes a 4% Return from having a meaningful -impact- toward ret. savings.
Then there’s Podunk..?
“They have a G fund that seems to guarantee the returns of a long term bond (4%).”
To clarify, most long-term bond funds face principle risk. If I understand your point, the G fund does not?
Correct, Bear. It’s a federal employees TSP fund that is invested in long-term bonds but is not the same as a bond fund. And it’s better than buying the actual securities because you can move in and out of it.
“Fund Selection
The TSP offers investors 10 funds in which to invest. Five are individual funds (one dealing with government bonds and the other four tracking specific market indices) while the other five are “Lifecycle Funds” designed to professionally change the allocation mix of investments among the individual funds during various stages of the employee’s Federal service. All TSP funds are trust funds that are regulated by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (and not the Securities and Exchange Commission; thus, there is no ticker symbol to track actual performance (though with the individual funds except the G Fund, the comparable index is easily tracked).
Employees may choose from any or all of the individual or Lifecycle funds in which to invest. If no selection is made the default is 100 percent allocation into the G Fund. As all funds except the G Fund have a potential risk of loss of principal, an employee is required to acknowledge this risk before investing into those funds.
Employees may also choose to change the allocation percentage of their existing fund balances . . . employees are limited to two unrestricted transfers per calendar month, all subsequent transfers must be into the G Fund only.
* G Fund[5] - Government Securities fund. These are unique government securities not available to the general public and are backed by the full faith and credit of the US Government. The G Fund was the initial fund established by the TSP when it began operations on April 1, 1987.
Government Securities fund. These are unique government securities not available to the general public and are backed by the full faith and credit of the US Government.
And therefore there’s no risk!
Other than the risk of devaluation of the “dollar”, of course.
‘Other than the risk of devaluation of the “dollar”, of course.’
Right, but what about the risk of dollar deflation? Wouldn’t that make anyone who bought the G fund look like a — a — what’s the word — GENIUS?
My point, Bear, is that if her 403B is currently invested in stocks, she is at great risk of losing much of it. She could put her retirement in the G fund temporarily, get 3.35% and move to whatever is higher-yielding when interest rates go up. Most of us don’t have that option - only cash or short term yields of 1-2%.
Well there’s always BND and AGG. Put in a limit sell order to protect yourself from when the Fed raises interest rates.
I was thinking of moving my IRA mutual fund moneys to one of those funky local bank IRAs. But then what bank or CU? They all seem a little hinky to me now.
I was thinking about that, too Montana, although I won’t retire for another two years. Hopefully by then interest rates will have improved. I’ll just break it up and put it in different banks, and maybe leave some with the employer.
“Pull your money out of Wall Street if you can. The major banks as well. Use your local credit union.”
Check, check, and check.
Joseph Stiglitz on American banks
Dec 1st 2010, 23:28 by The Economist online
The Nobel prize-winning economist says banks are undermining the rule of law in America and bad mortgages still fester
Whad’ya know: The very same Wall Street Megabanks currently playing foreclosure hardball with American households are, in many cases, the same ones that went hat-in-hand to the Fed for bailout funding when the chips were down in the Fall of 2008. Why is this not a case of illegal lending discrimination?
The Fed’s “WikiLeaks” moment
Dec 1st 2010, 23:28 by G.I. | WASHINGTON, DC
…
The details are interesting, even titillating, but not terribly surprising. The biggest banks tended to be the biggest borrowers. The data are a bit tricky to interpret: each loan is reported separately even when it represents the rollover of a maturing loan. Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citibank and JPMorgan Chase all borrowed at least $15 billion each via the Fed’s Term Auction Facility; the total outstanding at any one moment exceeded $45 billion in the case of Bank of America and Wells Fargo, according to Bloomberg.
…
The Fed borrows a note from Enron’s playbook: “GET SHORTY”
Where in its mandate does it say the Fed’s role includes picking winners and losers in the asset market?
Kramer Favors Citigroup as Federal Reserve Batters Shorts With Purchases
By Nick Baker and Rita Nazareth - Dec 2, 2010 10:16 AM PT
Dec. 2 (Bloomberg) — Orin Kramer, general partner at Boston Provident Partners LP, talks about U.S. fiscal policy and the Federal Reserve’s latest round of quantitative easing. He speaks with Carol Massar and Matt Miller on Bloomberg Television’s “Street Smart.” (Source: Bloomberg)
Betting against U.S. stocks may be a losing strategy given the Federal Reserve’s attempt to boost economic growth by driving down Treasury yields, according to hedge-fund manager Orin Kramer.
The Fed said last month that it will buy an additional $600 billion of Treasuries to boost growth, while maintaining its pledge to keep interest rates low for an “extended period.” Since Chairman Ben S. Bernanke suggested in August that he would use the technique known as quantitative easing, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index has surged 16 percent.
“They believe that by pushing down the risk-free rate, they can push people into risk assets and push up the value of risk assets,” Kramer, general partner of Boston Provident Partners LP and the former chairman of New Jersey’s pension fund, said today at the “Hedge Funds New York” conference hosted by Bloomberg Link. “If you’re short, the fact that the Fed is working against you and the fact that most of the world is somewhat short makes it a little more dangerous to be short.”
…
Ah, in the world of pensions and such the price of pension fund holdings determines the value of the the pension fund.
A pension fund (or any other kind of fund) which needs a eight-percent-or-so return to live up to its promises is hosed if the price - thus the value - of its holdings doesn’t return eight percent.
There are a LOT of underfunded pension obligations out there in The Real World, which translates to a lot of people in the future not receiving their promised pension benifits. So, what’s a PTB left to do? What action could a PTB possibly take to boost the value of pension funds so they can pay out their promised eight percent?
(Hint: In the financial world, when it comes to collateral, Price equals Value.)
Is it really a priority to anyone, if some 80 year old gets their pension reduced in 2025? There are a lot of pitchforks between here and there.
“Is it a priority to anyone …?”
It’s a priority to companies and states and cities that have underfunded pension plans. If their investments don’t return a planned-for eight-percent then these companies states and cities will have to (gasp) inject REAL MONEY into these plans to make up the difference - real money that they do not have.
And of course companies typically go bankrupt to evade their obligations to fund their pension plans when the fact that they are chronicly underfunded comes to a head. This is much more difficult for governments to do.
But if a deep-pocket PTB steps in and supports the price of the collateral that backs the underfunded plans then nobody has to go bankrupt.
And if joe Sixpack can be convinced that rising stock prices means rising stock values (as in Price equals Value) and he should “buy now or be priced out forever” then the Big Guys can unload their positions to Joe Sixpack and all will be well once again, at least for the Big Guys.
For a while.
And that “while” is rapidly approaching a middle, as the Boomer cohort beginst to retire and become a net drag on stock market prices rather than a boost.
Jim A,
( They’re already out )
A couple of rounds of 10% inflation will take care of those pension obligations.
If that 80 year old turns out to be your parent (or grand parent), are you ready willing and able to take them into your home and support them?
yes…and so are you. human’s are very adaptive to their environment.
I’m already caring for an 89 year old mother, a labor of love, but harder than I ever imagined.
I still remember when Mother Earth News skipped one issue to unburden itself of all those many thousands of hippies who had plunked down $500 for a supposidly “lifetime” subscription . There is no security in long-term planning as long as there is fine print anywhere in a “contract”. Nothing is forever in finance .
jess,
Or as we are fond of saying… “By law…!?!”
We’re ‘all’ fed up.
Remember, when caring for old ones, the key is soft, comfy pillows. Cozy, soft, muffling pillows.
“Remember, when caring for old ones, the key is…”
ice flows. Beautiful, cold, Atlantic bound ice flows.
My dear 80-year-old mom could tolerate the a reduction in SS or loss of Ford Motor pension. She lives on the pension ($900/month) and uses her required distribution from her IRA ($6000 per year) to make annual home improvements. Last year she bought a new furnace/ducts. She actually saves her $1000 per month SS payment! I keep encouraging her to enjoy herself more, but she is content to stay home, garden (she lives in Ventura, CA) and read. She has stopped taking her two medications because she doesn’t want the bother.
She is a HBB hero - bought her last house 35 years ago, paid it off 30 years ago and maintained it well. Has zero money problems, lives on half her small income and plans to leave money/house to her grandchildren.
I keep encouraging her to enjoy herself more, but she is content to stay home, garden (she lives in Ventura, CA) and read.
She sounds a lot like my mom.
Like my 80 year old parents she bought when it was cheap in Ventura Co. CA Has prop 13 and a pension payout. Good for her.
Try doing that now.
my parents are 67 and they are the same way.
I too, keep trying to point out that I’d rather my parents enjoy their retirement than leave me an inheritance. Of course a decade of assisted living could wipe them out irrespective of how much they have in saved up. Only time will tell.
Both of my grandmothers were completely wiped out financially by the time they died. Hundreds of thousands in medical and nursing home expenses ate up everything they had.
Combo,
You forgot to mention that the value of the
underlying assets also have lost value, thus forcing the managers into ever riskier moves
to try and recover the lost value. Think CA PERS.
If the “value” of the underlying assets is determined by the price of these assets then the value hasn’t been “lost”, it’s just “counted differently”.
A Beanie Baby’s “value” didn’t go up and down by hundred of dollars, its price is what went up and down by hundreds of dollars.
But in an environment where Price equals Value - where price is the only factor that determimes value - then the higher the price the higher the value. In this environment a Beanie Baby that was valued at hundreds of dollars was worth hundreds of dollars.
The same is true for stocks: If the Dow is priced at, say, 12,000 then that’s the value for the Dow. If a pension hezvily invested in the Dow is fully funded at a Dow of 12,000 then it is fully funded. If the Dow drops to, say, 8,000 then the pension becomes underfunded.
Push more money out there and the price of stocks will go up.
Price of many things will go up
Add Inflation to a economy with a bunch of under employed workers see what that does ?
And as the boomer cohort retires and goes from putting money INTO equities and starts taking that money out…. For the last couple of decades, we’ve been wondering where the ocean went, and gathering fish off of the newly expanded beach, thinking that this is the new normal. But that’s going to change, and the ocean is going to come rushing in, sweeping over houses destroying almost everything in its path/
The whole thing is collapsing (slowly). Think Titanic, its going to sink regardless of the bets that are made on whether it will or not. The FEDs action, especially the most recent, will go down in history as the single worst possible decision-making turn of events and abuse of power in the history of mankind. Bernanke will be remembered as power-tripping fool who did everything exactly wrong. His name will be permanantly associated with epic mistake-making land remembered with the likes of Ponzi, Mulligan, and Murphy.
Can’t hear over the crinkling foil covering my ears -
Was any of this legal?
December 3, 2010, 2:15 am Hedge Funds
Cross Section of Rich Invested With the Fed
By DEALBOOK
One investor, Kenneth H. Dahlberg, is a World War II flying ace who, as a volunteer in President Richard M. Nixon’s re-election campaign, was a minor figure in the Watergate scandal.
Another investor, Magalen O. Bryant, runs a horse farm in Virginia and is active in steeplechase racing circles. A third, Ward W. Woods, is the chairman of the nonprofit organization that runs the Bronx Zoo.
They were among scores of wealthy but lesser-known investors in an emergency lending program the Federal Reserve announced in November 2008, three weeks after President Obama’s election, to support the market for student, auto, credit card and small-business loans, Sewell Chan and Ben Protess report in The New York Times.
The investors, whose identities were disclosed as part of a trove of 21,000 records released on Wednesday at the direction of Congress, are a cross-section of America’s wealthy — investors who, in the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, heard about an opportunity and weighed the risk.
The list, not surprisingly, includes famous Wall Street financiers like J. Christopher Flowers, John A. Paulson and Julian Robertson, demonstrating the extent to which the Fed relied on fast-moving hedge funds to keep credit flowing through the markets.
…
You are either IN or you are out. I guess we are out.
And the list grows by naming individual (game)players…. These thugs are just the type that belong in prison. And there is no better place to begin than the horse fetish business. White, wealthy and snobbish.
White, wealthy and snobbish? It’s off to prison for you!
Don’t sweat it Bill. I’m no so deluded as to think that I’m ever going to be wealthy. And I have a bulletin for you…… you will be a peasant for all your remaining years. Just like the rest of us.
White, wealthy and snobbish? It’s off to prison for you!
Actually white, wealthy snobs rarely go to prison.
The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison
Jeffrey Reiman..is now in its sixth edition,
…Reiman states his thesis in the Introduction. He claims that the goal of the American criminal justice system is not to eliminate crime or even to achieve justice but to project to the people an image of the idea that the threat of crime eminates from the poor. The system must “maintain” a large population of poor criminals, and to this end, it must not reduce or eliminate the crimes that poor people commit.
…In the chapter, “Crime Control in America,” Reiman suggests that the system has been designed to fail. Imprisoning drug offenders, for instance, does nothing to reduce the number of drug offenders in society because they are immediately replaced. …
…As far as the criminal justice system is concerned, the face of crime is young, male, poor, and black. Reiman believes that the criminal justice system helps create this reality, projecting a particular image of crime and hiding the larger reality of social injustice and even white-collar crime. They identify crime as a direct, personal assault and ignore many other damages caused by carelessness and greed of a different order. …
…In the chapter, “. . . And the Poor Get Prison,” Reiman points out what many have noted that the offender in prison is most likely someone from one of the lowest social and economic groups in the nation. The poor are more likely to be arrested for a particular crime, while wealthier people are merely warned. Reiman uses evidence of the differential treatment of blacks for several reasons: 1) blacks are disproportionately poor; 2) the factors that are most likely to keep an offender out of prison do not apply to poor blacks; 3) blacks and whites in prison come from the same general socio-economic status; 4) race adds to the effects of economic condition; and 5) the economic powers in America could end or reduce racist bias in the criminal justice system if they wanted to do so. Reiman believes they see it as to their economic advantage not to curb crime. He finds that police, prosecutors, and judges all make certain that the poor are more likely to go to prison than the well-to-do. This should not be the case, given that white-collar crime is costly, widespread, and rarely punished. Even when arrested and convicted, white-collar criminals do not do the same amount of time as the poor, and do not go to the same prisons.
+1 Rio…Nice post…
The poor are more likely to be arrested for a particular crime, while wealthier people are…via their private attorney… merely warned
He finds that police, prosecutors, and judges all make certain that the poor are more likely to go to prison than the well-to-do, regardless of the latter’s financial efforts…via their private attorney.
(Hwy’s POV observations…)
Contrary to popular belief, there are a lot of white collar inmates.
But yes, the poor far outnumber the min security inmates.
Who could ever forget the $25,000 Dahlberg check?
It was later learned the $25,000 came from Dwayne Andreas, chief executive officer of Archer Daniels Midland, as an anonymous donation to the Nixon campaign. Woodward later commented that finding Dahlberg’s check was a turning point in their Watergate investigation because it led to the discovery of how the Watergate burglars were financed through a money-laundering scheme.
Home refinancing applications drop as interest rates rise
Fannie Mae says the typical rate that mortgage lenders were offering on 30-year fixed loans was 4.46% this week, up from last month’s record low of 4.17%.
By E. Scott Reckard and Alejandro Lazo, Los Angeles Times
December 3, 2010
Brightening economic signs are pushing interest rates higher, choking off a surge in home refinancing at the same time that buyers are showing more willingness to purchase houses at today’s beaten-down prices.
…
“Brightening economic signs are pushing interest rates higher”
More BS.
Buy now or be locked out of these low interest rates forever.
Buy now and be locked into this high principle forever. (Or, optimistic version: Buy now only if you can lock in BOTH low interest and low principle forever.)
Look at the large proportion of ARMS and worse during the bubble. Most bubble buyers didn’t lock in low interest rates, but now many behave is if having having the bank lower their principal is some sort of right. Like I said before, pay the mortgage or default on it. But don’t pretend that you have some sort of RIGHT to a negotiated partial settlement, or that this would make you something other than a dead beat, albiet a partial one.
“…but now many behave is if having having the bank lower their principal is some sort of right.”
Clueless fooks — though I believe clueless politicians added to the misconception by discussing this a couple of years back as a viable solution to the underwater problem. Never mind them investors who will get the value of their contractually-agreed investment returns whacked…
After the bad jobs data, bonds are up and yields are down. Mortgage rates will reach record lows again in short order.
I guess an expert on unbridled greed would be the person to consult on what qualifies as selfishness?
* December 2, 2010, 5:18 PM ET
Toll: Eliminating Mortgage Interest Tax Deduction Is ‘Selfish’
By Robbie Whelan
If Congress gets rid of the mortgage interest deduction who has the most to lose? Realtors? Homeowners? What about the struggling home-building industry?
A proposal to reduce the national deficit floated by the White House’s deficit commission is gaining bipartisan support, and it calls for $1.1 trillion in cuts, including axing the mortgage deduction, report Damian Paletta and Jonathan Weisman in today’s WSJ.
On Thursday, Toll Brothers chairman Bob Toll and lobbying group the National Association of Home Builders, both major players in the industry, railed against the proposed elimination of the tax break. (The National Association of Realtors has also been vocal in its opposition.)
…
I was always a home owner until July of 2004. I didn’t think the home owner deduction should have applied then and I don’t now. I never liked the reward of being in debt to get a tax deduction. Encouraging debt removes disposable income and enslaves the populace. Renters should also be up in arms as it’s unfair to them too.
“Encouraging debt removes disposable income and enslaves the populace.”
This is the MO of the banking cartel. They create $$ out of thin air then loan it to you. Thereby placing a claim on your future labor (which was definitely not created out of thin air).
It’s the ultimate scam.
P.S. I was asked the other day how I felt about the wikileaks saga. I replied that I loved it. I say let the sheeple see the total disregard in which they are held by the PTB. Hopefully this leaked information will have enough inertia to carry this forward. I’m getting tired of banging my drum.
“This is the MO of the banking cartel. They create $$ out of thin air then loan it to you. Thereby placing a claim on your future labor (which was definitely not created out of thin air).
It’s the ultimate scam.”
EHHHHHHG-ZACTLY.
Modern day slavery encompasses all races, ethnicities and religions now.
Modern day
slaveryHomemoanership encompasses all races, ethnicities and religions now.I say let the sheeple see the total disregard in which they (and their off-spring serving in the Military/Industrial Complex of Islamic Nation Building for Democracy) are held by the PTB
so what happened to the promised BofA leaks? was this blunted by the congress-ordered release of info?
The BofA leaks aren’t supposed to happen until early next year.
But if a leak is supposed to happen at a certain time, is it still a leak? I thought leaks were spontaneous.
It seems we have planned leaks nowadays…I thought the BofA dope was supposed to come out yesterday.
Julian is charged with “sex by surprise” (reported as rape in MSM). Evidently, failure to use a condom is punishable by a fine of $175.
She complained in her police statement that during the train ride to her hometown, “he paid more attention to his computer rather than me.” She also said that by the time they arrived at her apartment, “the passion and excitement seemed to have disappeared.”
http://www.aolnews.com/world/article/sex-by-surprise-at-heart-of-julian-assange-criminal-probe/19741444
“Sex by surprise” sounds like the sex life of most married guys I know.
They are usually “surprised” when they get it.
(But I’m sure it was all their fault……)
I was asked the other day how I felt about the wikileaks saga. I replied that I loved it.
Wikileaks is the internet delivering on Barack’s empty promise of “transparency”.
It’s called “disruptive technology” for a reason.
Hopefully this leaked information will have enough inertia to carry this forward.
I hope so and if the rule of law still applies to those higher up in America, it might.
So now, your landlord deducts his mortgage interest as a business expense. And will continue to do so even if the eliminate the mortgage deduction. When my friends poo-poo my intention of paying off my mortgage by saying “But what about your deduction?” my standadard response is “I’d rather be paying taxes on interest I’m earning than get a tax deduction on interest I’m paying.”
Making monthly payments made sense when incomes rose steadily as inflation would eat away from the sting of the payment. The MID was the icing on the cake.
Now incomes are stagnant and even falling and it looks like the MID is going bye-bye. Let’s see how they keep prices up now.
Actually, I’d argue that it is the inflation in rent rather than wages that really matters. Since housing is most people’s biggest expense they usually move in concert, but if your rent would have gone from 45% of income to 55% of income, locking in a mortgage that constitutes 50% of your income could turn out to be a good deal even if your wage doesn’t change.
The problem is that in areas that saw alot of bubble-inventtory added to the housing supply, we can expect rents to DECLINE.
Yup. Lots of condo buildings going to rentals. Lots.
It still doesn’t solve a fundamental problem of family housing. If you’re content to buy an apartment and live minimalist, you’re in luck. Most of those condos are one and two bedroom. The DC area banks on attracting the pretty young things at the beginnings of their careers as surely as AZ and FL banks on attracting *ahem* those at the end of their careers.
If you want kids…say hello to squished living.
Send up a flare when you see rents driop.
Oxy and others have been waiting breathlessly.
The DC area banks on attracting the pretty young things at the beginnings of their careers as surely as AZ and FL banks on attracting *ahem* those at the end of their careers.
Here in AZ, the seniors aren’t being recruited the way they once were. Why? Because once they get beyond the “active living” stage, they become a serious drain on public resources.
I didn’t think the home owner deduction should have applied then and I don’t now ??
The tax regs. were passed…People acted and took on huge obligations based on those tax regs…Eliminating the MID would cause massive foreclosures throughout the country IMO…If your going to do it, it needs to be going forward…If it encompasses all existing mortgages or even phases it in, Houston, we have a problem…
“Toll, as a builder of luxury homes, might have the most to lose of all the builders, because buyers at the high-end tend to itemize and might be swayed one way or another on buying a new home (or a new Toll Brothers home in particular) based on the savings that come from the deduction.”
Bad for business perhaps, but SELFISH? Hmm…
“Struggling” home building industry? Give me a break. They built cheap houses with under-the-table labor and made huge profits because their idea of “square footage” was huge rooms full of air, and their idea of “home” was attached product or a yard covered with concrete.
They should have known the bonanza was a windfall and put away for a rainy day. Smaller homebuilders should be focusing on well-built custom homes for wealthy clients. There is always demand for that.
I totally agree on this. My sister-in-law and her husband are living in a Tollstrosity. Postage stamp sized yard, 3000sq foot house. It looks pretty, but hearing about the issues (nails driven through waterlines that ruptured a few months later after leaking for the entire time, etc) I’m glad we didn’t buy one.
Instead, we’ve got our own issues with a 70 year old house. FUN!
Instead, we’ve got our own issues with a 70 year old house.
Houses….I have a brand new, old school, built like a brick *%#@house, reinforced concrete, heavy masonry, thick walled, clay tile roofed, granite and tiled house that with proper maintenance will last 200 years.
But you know what?
Yesterday I noticed 2 leaks on my ceiling.
A close family friend used to work for the Toll Brothers. I know I’ve said this here before, but for all of you HBB rookies, here’s the slogan he coined:
Toll Brothers Homes: Guaranteed for five years. Then they fall apart.
My mom loves to repeat that slogan.
Why did the image of an airplane in a tailspin with fire shooting out of its rear end just flash through my mind? I’m thinking the post-Katrina bounce is over by now…
The Associated Press
December 2, 2010, 12:13PM ET
Foreclosures: 10 percent of 3Q La. home sales
By ALAN SAYRE
NEW ORLEANS
Foreclosure homes accounted for 10 percent of all Louisiana home sales during the third quarter of 2010, a national tracking firm said Thursday.
Irvine, Calif.-based RealtyTrac said 534 homes in some stage of foreclosure — ranging from an initial notice of default to outright lender repossession — were sold in Louisiana during the July-through-September period, garnering an average price of $135,784.
That price constituted an average discount of 28.3 percent from a home not in foreclosure. Homes that had been repossessed by lenders were sold at an average discount of 33.9 percent, RealtyTrac said.
Homes that had not actually been taken by a lender and were in default or scheduled for sale went for an average discount of 16.4 percent.
The latest number of foreclosed homes that were sold in Louisiana dropped 29.2 percent from the second quarter of 2010 and 18.6 percent from the third quarter of 2009, RealtyTrac said.
RealtyTrac said the drop — like in all states — likely was due to a chilling in the foreclosure market, rather than an overall improvement in the national home loan crisis, along with the expiration of the homebuyer tax credit in the second quarter. A further aggravation is the dispute over the legality of many foreclosure actions by lenders, said RealtyTrac CEO James J. Saccacio
“The foreclosure-processing controversy, which was brought to light at the very end of the third quarter, could chill demand even further,” Saccacio said.
…
Ten percent is low. Nationally it was 25% in the third quarter.
Dec 2, 2010
OCC Official: Banks May Face Fines Due To Foreclosure Document Flaws
By Alan Zibel, Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- U.S. banks under examination for questionable foreclosure practices could face fines or criminal prosecution, a bank regulator said Thursday.
Julie Williams, chief counsel of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, said the agency is directing banks “to take immediate corrective action” to fix the problems.
Several major lenders, including Bank of America Corp. (BAC), Wells Fargo & Co. (WFC) and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. (JPM) have been reviewing thousands of foreclosure cases after revelations that they used so-called robosigners to file large numbers of foreclosure documents without reviewing their contents. Bank regulators and attorneys general in 50 states are investigating.
“We will not hesitate to take an enforcement action or impose civil money penalties, removals from banking and criminal referrals, if warranted,” Williams said at a House Judiciary Committee hearing.
…
or criminal prosecution
Ho ho, hah hah, hehehehehehe, BwaHaHaAhHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! (Cantankerous Intellectual Bomb-thrower™)
removals from banking….
Does this imply revoking their charter - the death penalty for a corporation?
The FDIC would make the depositors whole, but the shareholders and bondholders would eat it.
“CELEBRATION, Fla. (AP) — Celebration, Disney’s master-planned, picture-perfect central Florida community, has never reported a homicide in its 14-year existence - until this week.”
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_DEATH_IN_DISNEY_TOWN?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
Once met someone who lived in Celebration. He said the HOAs have more rules than your typical maximum security prison. Having been in neither, I can’t verify his claim.
National Review: Reinflating The Housing Bubble
by Kevin D. Williamson
December 2, 2010 Kevin D. Williamson is deputy managing editor of National Review and author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Socialism, to be published in January.
The Committee to Reinflate the Bubble — the National Association of Realtors, the builders’ lobby, and the rest of the gang committed to using government policy to artificially increase real estate prices, enriching themselves while undermining the economy and imperiling the nation — is now the Committee to Increase the Deficit. The Simpson-Bowles panel has released its deficit-reduction report, and, to nobody’s great surprise, the proposal to reduce bubblicious tax subsidies for homeowners has drawn a pledge of resistance from the most self-interested parties. Reports the WSJ:
“Joe Stanton, chief lobbyist for the National Association of Home Builders, said his organization would use “the full weight of our grass roots” to prevent any reduction of the mortgage-deduction tax break. “You are already talking about an industry that is completely battered, and this will kill us,” he said
http://www.npr.org/2010/12/02/131748890/national-review-reinflating-the-housing-bubble - -
Uh-oh. Call the Star — this is news. I find myself agreeing with the National Review.
“and this would kill us”
If the boys at NR need any help driving the wooden stakes home ( I’m available after the close of the market! )
Strong back, steady hands, good work ethic.
Jeff, thanks for re-centering the debate. Long overdue.
Get it straight from the horse’s….er….mouth. The NPR clip is just one entry from his ongoing economics blog at NR.
http://www.nationalreview.com/exchequer/254229/committee-increase-deficit
In general, the editors of the National Review have been guardedly optimistic about the Simpson-Bowles plan. They have been much more supportive than many liberal publications have been.
“You are already talking about an industry that is completely battered, and this will kill us,”
Would this be considered a case of euthanasia?
I’ve talked to a few people about this all are against getting rid of the mortgage interest deduction and can hardly beleive it will pass.
As a renter I think it would be great get rid of prop 13 too while you’re at it
As an owner, getting rid of Prop 13 would be great. Those freeloaders next door would have to start paying their share of the damn taxes.
As an owner, getting rid of Prop 13 would be great ??
Well, as a owner you are now protected from the greedy hand by prop #13…You wouldn’t think it was so “great” if the assessor sent you a 10% increase in your taxes each year…
Prop 13 shifts taxes from business to home owners, and from older generations to younger generations.
The goal of prop 13, which is to reign in wildly growing tax burdens could be done without making it punitive on new home owners and without making it easy for companies to avoid ever paying taxes even when purchasing retail property. (They just buy it with 3 different ‘entities’ and rent it to the fourth who runs the actual business, or other shenanigans.)
Prop 13 is an absolute turdburger of a law. I pay 10 times what many of my neighbors do.
Want another unfair prop 13? Baseline taxes based on sq footage of the house (1/3) and sq footage of the lot (2/3) and let it NEVER increase more than CPI per year. The only way it ever changes is through additions. Maintenance like replacing worn out kitchens = no tax increase. Selling a house = no tax increase.
That way the rich people can party down with taxes in palo alto == east palo alto for same sized houses/lots.
The point is, if you try and engineer taxes like that, you wind up screwing people over. As one of the screwed over, I can tell you Prop 13 is a terrible implementation.
As a renter I think it would be great get rid of prop 13 too while you’re at it ??
Yeah, it would be great right up to the point where the county tax assessor quadrupled the tax assessments on all the apartment buildings in the county…Thats just about the time you would revive a 50% increase in your rent to cover it…
I would move leave the state
Happy trails
The problem with Prop 13 is that it cuts too broadly. Old companies with huge landholdings (HP, Intel, Warner Bros.) get away with tiny tax bills, which isn’t fair to new competitors. Plus why should rich people with 2nd and 3rd vacation homes get a break?
Since moving here, I’ve found that Idaho has a much better solution. You are re-assessed every year based on square footage and a neighborhood multiplier. For owner-occupied houses, they take about $100,000 right off the top of the assessed value prior to calculating the tax. Since most houses here are around $180K, that’s a HUGE tax break for owners.
Owners of multiple properties and commercial RE owners don’t get the $100K exemption and pay “full fare”.
Poor old people get additional property tax breaks, based upon income. Rich old people pay their fair share of property taxes.
I think this solution is much better than California’s Prop. 13.
I think this solution is much better than California’s Prop. 13 ??
Well, I would not disagree that it has caused some large inequities particularly on the commercial side…Residential usually turns over within a reasonable period of time…
However, you need to look at the root cause for its passage…The “tax man” came every time they had to fund a new union contract or pension, expand city government, build this & buy that….
People may have forgotten how guilty the NAR are of pushing debauched lending standards. They were THE organization to profit from bad lending. Bad lending = high house prices = more cash in the realtor’s pockets.
The NAR is the 4th largest political donor during the period 1989 - 2010:
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php
(And another data point that’s kind of startling - look at the recipient party of the top 20 all time donors.)
Distressed Homes in U.S. Sell at Biggest Discount in Five Years
By John Gittelsohn - Dec 2, 2010 12:00 AM ET
U.S. homes in the foreclosure process sold for about 32 percent less than non-distressed properties in the third quarter, the biggest discount in five years, as buyer demand slumped, according to RealtyTrac Inc.
41% Discount
Bank-owned real estate sold at an average 41 percent discount in the third quarter, up from 35 percent a year earlier, RealtyTrac said. Discounts for homes in default or scheduled for auction averaged 19 percent, compared with 18 percent a year earlier. Most of those properties were short sales, in which a lender accepts less than the balance on a mortgage, said Daren Blomquist, a RealtyTrac spokesman.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-12-02/distressed-u-s-homes-sell-at-biggest-discount-since-2005-as-demand-slumps.html - 55k
“Bank-owned real estate sold at an average 41 percent discount in the third quarter, up from 35 percent a year earlier, RealtyTrac said.”
Important question: Are these deep discounts reflective of quality issues, or simply due to the lenders wanting to sell quickly?
We might actually be seeing the banks starting to clear inventory.
Check out this site. (/www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1334672/Jaw-dropping-image-enormous-supercell-cloud-Glasgow-Montana.html) Awesome pics, probably what the world financial markets would look like if we could put the numbers into pictures.
“Check out this site. (/www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1334672/Jaw-dropping-image-enormous-supercell-cloud-Glasgow-Montana.html) Awesome pics, probably what the world financial markets would look like if we could put the numbers into pictures.”
I downloaded a number of pictures from this photographer when they were on one of the montana newspaper sites. In fact my laptop background picture is from the same storm. They incredible pictures.
They incredible pictures.
Wow! They are. And that sky looks really big there in Montana.
Beauty is where you find it too. This summer I was telling some Midwest friends what they had that was way prettier than coastal California’s was their ever changing, beautiful and oftentimes violent sky. The various clouds and weather patters changed the natural lighting like a thousand different lens filters would do in photography.
Having been away for so long, I had forgotten its wonder.
Ha, The Great Plains…of my youth…what happened?
Now, sleeping outside next to a small Nebraska corn field 10 miles square…the constant 24 hour sound of motors running water-pumps, (the cicada’s are the background choir)
A Financial Party Platter
Nine economic thoughts to nibble on as you recover from Thanksgiving dinner.
By Bethany McLean
Posted Tuesday, Nov. 30, 2010, at 5:29 PM ET
The housing crisis ain’t over. My friend and fellow Williams graduate David Pesikoff this fall observed the following in a weekly newsletter for investors in his hedge fund:
So while we have sideshows like Greece and the Fed and our trade deficit and on and on, it’s important to remember what got us into this mess we’re in: housing. The price bubble we created in housing made the NASDAQ bubble of 2000 look like the work of amateurs. While home real estate value is back to where it was in 2003, mortgage debt is up 50% or $3.4 trillion. So while prices may have round-tripped into fair territory, it will take years to work off the increase in debt. And if we get deflation, all bets are off.
Have a nice day!
http://www.slate.com/id/2276319/ - 54k
jeff saturday!
God love you and your friend David! It’s been grand poking fun at all the freaks in the sideshow, and I’ve enjoyed it if for nothing other than the entertainment value?
But it totally misses and dismisses the core issue of what -brought- us here! ( Great way to pass the time though? )
Isn’t Bethany McLean the same Fortune reporter who called out Enron?
Wall Street Banks are Bad For Society:
http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/wall-street-banks-are-doing-less-and-less-good-for-society-says-john-cassidy-535678.html?tickers=%5EDJI,%5EGSPC,GS,XLF,ms,skf,skf&sec=topStories&pos=9&asset=&ccode=
If there was any doubt at the time about the real purpose of the TARP and all of the Fed’s alphabet soup of special low-interest lending programs to Wall Street investment banks, foreign banks, hedge funds and major financiers, the purpose should now be clear: They served to allocate to the largest, most powerful financial institutions in the global financial system all the financial fire power they needed, directly from the U.S. Treasury’s coffers, to foreclose on hapless, helpless Main Street American households. If this is granting of special powers to destroy American household wealth is considered to be incontrovertible evidence that the Fed avoided a second Great Depression, then “All hail, the Fed, hail to thee.”
If this is granting of special powers to destroy American household wealth is considered to be incontrovertible evidence that the Fed avoided a second Great Depression, then “All hail, the Fed, hail to thee.”
Something tells me that the Americans with the destroyed wealth aren’t taking this lying down. And when the lefties get around to forming their Tea Party equivalent, look out.
Won’t happen. The lefties are in the middle of an interal war. The Obama-is-doing-what-he-can camp is battling the Obamas-not-doing-enough-primary-him camp.
btw, the Americans with destroyed wealth ARE taking this lying down. They’ve been convinced that it’s the government who’s behind all this. And God will provide.
Won’t happen. The lefties are in the middle of an interal war. The Obama-is-doing-what-he-can camp is battling the Obamas-not-doing-enough-primary-him camp.
I’m noticing that very battle on sites like FireDogLake and DailyKos. It gets a bit tiring.
The lefties are in the middle of an interal war.
The Big Economic Story, and Why Obama
Isn’t Telling It
http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/279-82/4116-the-big-economic-story-and-why-obama-isnt-telling-it
Quiz: What’s responsible for the lousy economy most Americans continue to wallow in?
A. Big government, bureaucrats, and the cultural and intellectual elites who back them.
B. Big business, Wall Street, and the powerful and privileged who represent them.
These are the two competing stories Americans are telling one another.
Yes, I know: It’s more complicated than this. In reality, the lousy economy is due to insufficient demand - the result of the nation’s almost unprecedented concentration of income at the top. The very rich don’t spend as much of their income as the middle. And since the housing bubble burst, the middle class hasn’t had the buying power to keep the economy going. That concentration of income, in turn, is due to globalization and technological change - along with unprecedented campaign contributions and lobbying designed to make the rich even richer and do nothing to help average Americans, insider trading, and political bribery.
So B is closer to the truth.
But A is the story Republicans and right-wingers tell. It’s a dangerous story because it deflects attention from the real problem and makes it harder for America to focus on the real solution - which is more widely shared prosperity. (I get into how we might do this in my new book, “Aftershock.”)
A is also the story President Obama is telling, indirectly, through his deficit commission, his freeze on federal pay, his freeze on discretionary spending, and his wavering on extending the Bush tax cuts for the rich.
If Obama and the Democrats were serious about story B they’d at least mention it. They’d tell the nation that income and wealth haven’t been this concentrated at the top since 1928, the year before the Great Crash. They’d be indignant about the secret money funneled into midterm campaigns. They’d demand Congress pass the Disclose Act so the public would know where the money comes from.
They’d introduce legislation to curb Wall Street bonuses - exactly what European leaders are doing with their financial firms. They’d demand that the big banks, now profitable after taxpayer bailouts, reorganize the mortgage debt of distressed homeowners. They’d call for a new WPA to put the unemployed back to work, and pay for it with a tax surcharge on incomes over $1 million.
They’d insist on extended unemployment benefits for long-term jobless who are now exhausting their benefits. And they’d hang tough on the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy - daring Republicans to vote against extending the cuts for everyone else.
But Obama is doing none of this. Instead, he’s telling story A.
I read this article yesterday, I am still recovering from the shock of partially agreeing with Robert Riesch. Strange times make strange bedfellows, I guess.
I read this article yesterday, I am still recovering from the shock of partially agreeing with Robert Riesch.
I’m still in shock over the fact that I agreed with a National Review article that was posted yesterday.
MACBETH. Speak, if you can. What are you?
FIRST WITCH: All hail, Macbeth, hail to thee, Thane of Glamis!
SECOND WITCH: All hail, Macbeth, hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor!
THIRD WITCH: All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be King hereafter!
BANQUO: Good sir, why do you start, and seem to fear
Things that do sound so fair?
There must RV parking to spare at the doing-what-he-can camp, but what’s really at issue here is they’ve basically emasculated CPA’s etc.
Not sure if that was the intent but why bother calling your tax guy when they don’t know any more than ‘you’ do? Go ahead and destroy the wealth, we can always make more.
The question is, why bother?
Editorial
The Fed and Foreclosures
Published: November 28, 2010
There are two sides to every delinquent loan — a lender who made a bad lending decision and a borrower who cannot repay. Yet, banks have never acted as if they bear responsibility for the mortgage mess.
They have pursued foreclosures in violation of borrowers’ rights to due process, as revealed by the recent robo-signing scandal. And, despite having been bailed out for their mistakes, they have pursued their self-interest, not the public interest, when it comes to modifying bad loans. They have resisted reducing principal balances for troubled borrowers, for instance, because that could force them to take losses they would rather delay.
Now, despite mounting evidence of borrower mistreatment, the Federal Reserve has proposed a rule that would disable the most effective legal tool that borrowers have to fight foreclosures.
…
It’s GOOD to be the Banksta!
Cat Cohen — “Banksta Rap” LIVE at Kulak’s Woodshed
This guy is awesome!!!
The banksta era is upon us — already immortalized in classic song.
“…
He says he’ll bail you out if you get in hot water
But instead you’ll catch an STD from his daughter…”
The fellow who writes this chronicle, called The Audit, is at the Columbia Journalism School. This series gives me hope that American financial journalism has a bright future ahead of it!
Economic Crisis, The Audit — December 3, 2010 12:36 AM
Audit Notes: Too Big to Fail Edition
By Ryan Chittum
Kansas City Fed President Thomas Hoenig has a must-read op-ed in The New York Times on why too big to fail has to go. He gets at one of the big reasons why the American public is so irate and/or disillusioned these days, which is particularly relevant in the wake of the Fed disclosures of the last couple of days:
Care to argue against this?
— Mike Konczal (aka Rortybomb) riffs off Hoenig’s op-ed to make the point that the bailouts benefited giant financial corporations to the detriment of small-to-medium-sized ones.
If you’re too big to fail, you have regulators and taxpayers over a barrel. That shows up in the bailout numbers, and Konczal has a couple of charts that illustrate that well. With the FDIC debt-guarantee program, for instance, 75 percent of the bailout went to just six giant banks. The remainder got split up between the 14,225 others.
…
Where’s the Public Option Bank when you need it?
Oxide, have you suggested that to anyone in The One’s administration? We already have a public option car company, public option insurance company, et. al. Why not a public option bank?
They would put your money into a “Trust Fund” or “Lock Box” where you’d never see it again!
What Public Option insurance company are you talking about?
Does anyone really think these “banks” won’t blow up again?
Jobs numbers just came out: +39k - waaay below estimates. Worse than expected. Should be good for a huge rally on Wall Street.
Thats ok my friend.the fed will continue to print more money so wall street can have cash to invest in high flyers like aapl and cmg.It’s a new bull market.goldman said we can expect 23% returns next year.
Bad unemployment #s. Great argument for extending unemployment benefits. Amazing.
Sea World Cuts Workers Adrift:
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/os-seaworld-layoffs-20101202,0,5393558.story
From what I have read the numbers at the Mouse House have been poor as well. I guess there are only so many families that can afford to drop $5000 on a theme park vacation.
Just an observation, we’ve seen very few if ANY Christmas Tree lots actually OPEN this year. And that’s in OR where the trees come from!
Many lots just have a sign saying they’ll be ‘open’ but there’s no trees or lot attendant. I’d think if you got nothing else, at least you’d get a tree? IMHE
Virtual tree lots. I guess everyone is buying trees online from their iphones.
Here in Idaho many people pay the $10 for a Xmas tree permit, and go cut their own in the national forests.
http://www.idahostatesman.com/2010/11/11/1413477/dont-forget-your-christmas-tree.html
“Just an observation, we’ve seen very few if ANY Christmas Tree lots actually OPEN this year”
Same here. I guess those reusable artificial trees have caught on.
They must spray insecticide on commercially harvested trees. When our kids were young we “cut our own” one time and brought it in and set it up the day before Christmas. The next morning there was all this new “angel hair” on the tree. Hundreds of tiny spiders (no more than dots) had hatched from an unseen egg mass near the top and worked their way down the tree to the presents and the floor.
Christmas Trees
Man, it’s really strange seeing all this Christmas stuff when you’re sweating and it’s 90 degrees out.
and it’s 90 degrees out ??
Your killing me Rio….Stop the teasing…:)
Noticably fewer “commercially” decorated homes around this year. That was quite the trend starting five years ago or so. I called once just out of curiosity and was told that outdoor packages started at $795.00 Plus tax.
fewer “commercially” decorated homes ??
Well, I would not call ours commercially decorated but I threw three or four strings up this afternoon…Helped a couple of elderly neighbors with theirs also…Amazing how far a 6 pack will carry you…
BofA Mortgage Morass Deepens After Employee Says Notes Not Sent
By Prashant Gopal and Jody Shenn - Nov 29, 2010 9:00 PM PT
The headquarters of Bank of America Corp. in Charlotte, North Carolina. Photographer: Davis Turner/Bloomberg
Testimony by a Bank of America Corp. employee in a New Jersey personal bankruptcy case may give more ammunition to homeowners and investors in their legal battles over defaulted mortgages.
Linda DeMartini, a team leader in the company’s mortgage- litigation management division, said during a U.S. Bankruptcy Court hearing in Camden last year that it was routine for the lender to keep mortgage promissory notes even after loans were bundled by the thousands into bonds and sold to investors, according to a transcript. Contracts for such securitizations usually require the documents to be transferred to the trustee for mortgage bondholders.
In the case, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Judith H. Wizmur on Nov. 16 rejected a claim on the home of John T. Kemp, ruling his mortgage company, now owned by Bank of America, had failed to deliver the note to the trustee. That could leave the trustee with no standing to take the property, and raises the question of whether other foreclosures could similarly be blocked.
Following the decision, the bank disavowed the statements by DeMartini, whom it had flown in from California to testify. It was the policy of Countrywide Financial Corp., acquired by Bank of America in July 2008, to deliver notes as called for in its securitization contracts, according to Larry Platt, an attorney at K&L Gates LLP in Washington designated by the bank to answer questions about the case.
“This particular employee was mistaken in what she said,” Platt said in a telephone interview.
…
That Kemp case is the gift that keeps on giving!
Ms. Demartini is to BOA, as Mrs. O’Leary’s cow is to Chicago.
Surely there is a remedy in equity!! Well, except when it comes to real property conveyances…
Easy solution : Let the banks foreclose, but they have to pay a penalty equal to 25% of the loan for improper servicing of the loans, which goes to the FDIC to bail out the account holders when the banks all implode from paying the fees for being miscreant bankers.
Later on, better lending standards will be the rule!
Got an e-mail yesterday from the performing arts group where I volunteer. Sales for the big Christmas show are down 7.5% over previous years. The show has very broad appeal and lots of families with kids attend. I’ve had people tell me that they consider attending it to be the beginning of their holiday season. Tickets aren’t cheap, but they aren’t that bad either.
People are cutting back.
That’s ’cause they spent so much already on Black Friday.
And this is in the DC area where middle class* employment and wages have been comparativly stable. Like I said yesterday, it really has surprised me just how much of the economy over the last decade has been fueled by Mortgage Equity Withdrawal. When that dried up, we ended up with what has been the WORST decline in employement in the post war period.
*I’m under the impresstion that this is not nearly as true at the bottom of the economic ladder.
My standard of living started going down the crap tube in earnest about 1995.
It’s was easier to notice if you didn’t run up the credit cards, or jump on the MEW/Let-your-home-equity-work-for-you bandwagon
Wasn’t that about the time that major carriers discoverd that they could get their maintenance done offshore for cheap? Even if that wouldn’t affect you directly, it has to drag down the market for A+P maintenance generally.
Our local food pantry posted its holiday appeal flyers up the other day. At the very bottom of the flyer they mention that just two years ago they had 750 families registered, this year it’s over 3,000.
Your local food pantry should sell shares in itself and tell investors it’s well-positioned in a rapid-growth industry.
Housing as a rapid-growth industry - check
War as a rapid growth industry - check
Education as a rapid growth industry - check
Healthcare as a rapid growth industry - check
Debt Consuling as a rapid growth industry - check
Hunger as a rapid growth industry - hey, why not?
Hunger as a rapid growth industry - hey, why not ??
Our priorities in this country are all screwed up…
I’m sure the boyz down at the CME could rig up a futures exchange in no time flat, especially since their carbon trading scheme recently wound down.
I keep asking; where are all the runty, skinny, malnourished people if hunger is so rampant (47 million on food stamps)? I don’t see many in my travels.
Because obese people ARE malnourished. The cheapest and best tasting food is empty sugar and salt, and kids start eating this at a young age. More than once I’ve seen a mom shove a juice box or a McD soda at fidgety kid. The kid sucks on a straw and gets this LOOK on her face. It’s not far off from a drug addiction.
By the time the kids are school aged, that addiction is hard-wired. They won’t eat good food even if it were free.
(I’m reading “The end of eating.”)
The cheapest and best tasting food is empty sugar and salt, and kids start eating this at a young age.
In Brazil the processed foods are way more expensive than in the USA. The poor kids here, (if not too poor of course) look mostly lean and strong. Lots of rice and beans.
More of the richer kids are getting fatter than in years past.
school aged, that addiction is hard-wired. They won’t eat good food even if it were free?
When we were raising our children I would put something on their vegetables to encourage them to eat them (a little blue cheese dressing on the asparagus or olive oil & vinegar on the Cauliflower for example)…Although this clearly went against the grain of natural eating of the different varieties I hoped that it would help them develop a taste for them…It worked…:)
Processed food is plenty expensive here. I don’t even go near the freezers where they keep all that crap.
“Because obese people ARE malnourished. The cheapest and best tasting food is empty sugar and salt, and kids start eating this at a young age. More than once I’ve seen a mom shove a juice box or a McD soda at fidgety kid. The kid sucks on a straw and gets this LOOK on her face. It’s not far off from a drug addiction. “
When I first heard this some year ago, I laughed. I recalled the snarky observation that the US is one of the few societies in the world where the poor people are fat and the rich people are thin.
But - your malnourishment observation I think is spot on. Many modern foods do not go bad. The only time in recent memory that food has gone bad is when I bought bread from some organic food store. It actually got moldy.
My point is then - if environmental bacteria cannot devour the foods, how is our normal gut bacteria supposed to devour it? That is a normal part of human digestion.
I’m getting the sense that many highly preserved foods are like movie prop foods - they have good mouthfeel and they deliver sugar and fat as a result. But if the body can’t digest them, it still feels hungry. And craves more as a result. And this could be a factor in the modern obesity epidemic.
We had a big Turkey give away in Spokane the Monday before Tgiving. They expected upwards of 4,000 people and got enough turkeys for that many. We had a cold snap on give away day (about 0), and only half the number expected showed up. The charity said they believed that the potential receipients did not want to stand in line when it was so cold.
The charity said they believed that the potential receipients did not want to stand in line when it was so cold.
My mother hails from Buffalo. As far as she’s concerned, zero degrees is nice, warm winter weather.
BofA Drags Balance Sheet Confidence Backward: Jonathan Weil
By Jonathan Weil - Dec 1, 2010 6:00 PM PT
Bloomberg Opinion
The more we learn about the mortgage industry’s documentation snafus, the more troubling hints we get that the financial statements of some of our biggest banks may be less reliable than anyone imagined.
Here’s the latest: Thanks to a Nov. 16 court ruling in Camden, New Jersey, we now know that a Bank of America Corp. employee, Linda DeMartini, testified last year that the lender routinely retained possession of mortgage promissory notes and related documents, even after loans were packaged into bonds that were sold to investors. If we’re to believe what she said, it raises the prospect that some of those loans still should be on Bank of America’s balance sheet today.
…
Government-engineered BigPharma/Insurance/Medicaid Racket Flagship Product “Soma” Kills:
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/health/os-deaths-florida-report-20101202,0,4104711.story
Two of my nephews, young men in their early 20’s, have gotten themselves addicted to Rx drugs. One has been in and out of Rehab numerous times, the other is on his second go-around. Very sad, both seemed to have been good kids, the power of that stuff is amazing.
This increase in the unemployment rate should offer still more lucrative prospects for the largest and most powerful Wall Street and other international banks, which the summarily Fed bailed out, to continue on their foreclosure rampage against defenseless American families.
Unemployment Rises to 9.8% as U.S. Adds Just 39,000 Jobs
By Timothy R. Homan - Dec 3, 2010 5:39 AM PT
U.S. Added 39,000 Jobs in November
People check the jobs board at a Denver Workforce Center. Photographer: Matthew Staver/Bloomberg
U.S. Added 39,000 Jobs in November
The Marriner S. Eccles Federal Reserve Board building.
Photographer: Joshua Roberts/Bloomberg
Employers added fewer jobs than forecast in November and the unemployment rate unexpectedly increased, vindicating the Federal Reserve’s decision to pump more money into the economy to spur growth.
Payrolls increased 39,000, less than the most pessimistic projection of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News, after a revised 172,000 increase the prior month, Labor Department figures showed today in Washington. The jobless rate rose to 9.8 percent, the highest since April, while hours worked and earnings stagnated.
…
ABC Disguises Democratic Activist as Victim of Mean-Spirited GOP
By Scott Whitlock | December 02, 2010 | 11:30
Good Morning America’s Claire Shipman on Thursday tried to disguise a Democratic activist as just a jobless American who would be hurt by Republican failure to extend unemployment benefits. Shipman sympathetically recounted that Edrie Irvine, who she didn’t explain spoke at a Nancy Pelosi press conference on Wednesday, “never thought her very livelihood would depend on a political debate in Congress.”
A graphic reading “unemployed” appeared onscreen as Irvine complained, “They are talking about tax cuts for the rich and are holding people like me hostage.” Who is Ms. Irvine? According to her bio on the leftist Democracy For America web page, she’s a “tree-hugging, bleeding-heart, ACLU-card-carrying progressive liberal and damn proud of it!”
On December 1, Irvine appeared with Nancy Pelosi at a press conference. Pelosi enthused, “Thank you very much, Edrie, for your generosity of spirit to share your personal story with us.” On October 2, Irvine also appeared at the liberal One Nation rally and spoke. (One Nation was coordinated by the AFL-CIO and the SEIU, among others.) Shouldn’t Shipman have mentioned any of this?
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/scott-whitlock/2010/12/02/abc-disguises-democratic-activist-victim-mean-spirited-gop -
Does that make her the anti-Joe the Plumber?
The dems doing what the republicreeps have been pulling for years and now it’s news.
The hypocrisy knows no bounds.
I love it when the repubicans keep “ed-a-katin’” the Democrapts…
“Anything you can do ,we can do almost-nearly-just-about-the-same-but-in-a-non-evangelical-wuss-sorta-kinda-way!”
Yell, Scream, Holler,…pout!
“TrueDoNothing™ / “TrueObstructionists™ / TrueGridLokers™”
Pouting - The Snout reflex is a pouting or pursing of the lips that is elicited by light tapping of the closed lips near the midline. The contraction of the muscles causes the mouth to resemble a snout.
The Wealthy in America need TAX RELIEF! NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Good Morning America’s Claire Shipman on Thursday tried to disguise a Democratic activist as just a jobless American who would be hurt by Republican failure to extend unemployment benefits.
Is the main story here she was NOT unemployed?
Or that because she was a democratic activist her unemployment situation was not a valid subject to be discussed in the media?
Or that the ramifications of being unemployed do not affect someone who is an activist for either party?
Run, run! It’s the leebrul activist bogeyman!
Having read the “expose,”” nowhere on that website has anyone proven she isn’t unemployed.
Robert Powell’s Your Portfolio
Dec. 3, 2010, 12:01 a.m. EST
If plan to trim deficit dies, start worrying
Commentary: For investors, a tax overhaul is not the problem
…
Inflation protection
Others agree, but suggest that positioning one’s portfolio for rising inflation might be prudent.
“The better question might be, ‘If the proposed changes are not made, what sort of changes might investors make to their portfolios?’” said E. Tylor Claggett, a chartered financial analyst and professor of finance at the Perdue School of Business at Salisbury University.
“I am skeptical that any of the recommendations will be enacted. Our politicians will not pay the political price in the short run to produce the projected benefits in the long run,” he said. “So, I predict that the public will pay the long-run cost of an economy that is subject to ever persistent inflation, liquidity crises and high structural unemployment.”
In other words, “investors should really think seriously about stocks and bonds that will preserve their purchasing power in a high-inflation environment,” said Claggett.
…
Real Unemployment rate is 17.5% as per CNBC. Labor Dept. reports 9.8%. ALl the reports before today this week were fake. All the 350 points Dow moved up this week was on fake reports.
Say it ain’t so.
That cant be true.The bls never lies.They get thier data from reputable govt sources.
I’m not so sure unemployment affects the DOW all that much. After all, layoffs are GOOD for a company’s bottom line. Employees are expensive, and the most efficient company would have NO employees at all. (hmmm… Golden Sacks’ computer-operated lightning-fast stock trading comes to mind…)
“After all, layoffs are GOOD for a company’s bottom line.”
But only if that company is the only one doing it. When a LOT of companies are laying off then ALL the companies take a hit.
Employees = customers with money to spend.
Plus … Employees with money (and hope) make for hefty stock prices.
What are you? Some kinda damn socialeest/commie?! Making sure people have jobs is just welfare and distorts the free (for all) market!!
Maybe you missed that Citi Group report that says our consumer driven economy doesn’t need consumers?! (no joke. Google “plutonomy report”)
U.S. Deficit-Cutting Panel’s $3.8 Trillion Plan on Brink of Being Rejected (bloomibergi)
“A presidential commission’s $3.8 trillion debt-cutting plan is set to be rejected after five members from both political parties said they would oppose its mix of tax increases and cuts in programs such as Social Security and Medicare.
The commission appointed by President Barack Obama, scheduled to vote today, needs approval from 14 of 18 members to forward the proposal to Congress for consideration. ”
Sen Baucus (D) — no
Rep Jan Schakowsky (D)– no
Rep Paul Ryan (R) — no
Rep Dave Camp (R) — no
Andy Stern, former SEIU — no
“The proposal by panel co-chairmen Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson would increase taxes $1 trillion by 2020 by scaling back or eliminating hundreds of tax deductions, exclusions and credits, such as those letting homeowners write off interest on their mortgage payments.
It would cut Social Security benefits, raise the gas tax by 15 cents, reduce discretionary spending by $1.6 trillion and cut Medicare by more than $400 billion. The plan would reduce the annual deficit — $1.3 trillion this year — to about $400 billion from 2015, and would start reducing the national debt.”
Sen Dick Durbin (D) — yes
Sen Tom Coburn (R) — yes
Sen Mike Crapo(R) — yes
Sen Gregg (R) — yes
Sen Kent Conrad (D) — yes
David Cote, Honeywell — yes
Ann Fudge, Young&Rubicam — yes
Alice Rivlin — yes
Bowles — yes
Simpson — yes
How much you want to bet that Obama tries to split up the provisions to gain a few votes for each? Perhaps the 15 cent gas tax has to go, maybe some leeway on the MID, some of the tax deductions but not all… IMO this plan is too good to waste entirely.
Medicare cuts are a non starter.
I agree with the Medicare cuts and the gas tax and elimination of the
mortgage deduction ,but thats about it . Of course I’m coming from my
own selfish position in which these are the areas I’m willing to compromise on . Other than that I want the Fat Cats to pay a bigger share .
Geez even my Senator Crapo (pronounced “cray-poe”), from reddest-state Idaho, is for it. Something has to be done and this is a good-faith attempt at sharing the pain.
They’ll no doubt hack it all up so much that the bill that eventually gets passed will make things even worse..sigh.
How many out there remember the “Grace Commission” from around 1985? Same mandate as the deficit reduction commission, generated lots of good recommendations, the implementation rate was close enough to zero to call it that.
Oh, BTW, we were stewing greatly about a $2Trillion National Debt and a couple of hundred billion budget deficit at the time. Seems quaint by todays standard.
Maybe they can start by ending tax breaks for offshoring jobs.
Oh wait, they just tried that and the GOP successfully voted against it.
This book includes the mortgage interest deduction as an example of welfare for the rich.
Take the Rich off Welfare
by Mark Zepezauer
Paperback, 160 pages
Published April 1st 2004 by South End Press (first published 2004)
Mark Zepezaur’s a fellow Tucsonan.
For many years, he published something called the Tucson Comic News. It juxtaposed the comics with Mark’s commentary on world events.
Good stuff. And I still miss that publication.
it’s more of a bank subsidy to me.
Thankxs for the HBB Continuing Education reading list Mr. Bear!
Stay focused America! …Food Stamps, get angry!
Our Corporate sponsor : MUrDoch’s “TrueProvoker ™” Faux News
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review:
Thank God the U.S. government has begun to cut funding of the arts, humanities, and social services … but what are they going to do with all that surplus cash? Although the popular media has been largely mum about it, most of the welfare payments go to large corporations in the form of tax write-offs, subsidies, and plain old handouts. This frightening and enlightening book by the editor of The Tucson Comic News (a monthly collection of comic strips and panels) traces the flow of money into such worthy projects as subsidizing nuclear power plants (the last one was finished in 1973, but that doesn’t stop the U.S. government from spending $7.1 billion a year on this vapor industry), tax breaks for the tobacco industry ($41 million last year), and corporate expense account write-offs ($5.5 billion last year).
Read it and
weepuse it to ed-a-kate the “TrueAnger™” “TrueHypocrite’s™” .Product Description:
This tightly written, fact-filled book covers the S&L bailout, subsidies to the agriculture, airline, automobile, chemical, energy, logging, media, mining, oil and weapons industries, tax loopholes for accelerated depreciation, advertising, banking, business meals and entertainment, capital gains, insurance and overseas marketing,…
It was shown one year that all those tax breaks and handouts to large corps was equal to or greater than the military budget.
But to point that out must be class envy, right?
Whipping up fear over reducing mortgage deduction
By Dennis Wyatt
Managing Editor
UPDATED Dec. 3, 2010 2:53 a.m.
Trimming the deficit isn’t going to be an easy task as long as the debate is long on fear and short on rationale discussions.
Case in point: Politicians, websites, news channels, and pundits have all been beating the drum about President Obama’s bipartisan deficit reduction committee’s recommendation to “reduce” the mortgage interest deduction.
…
The entire idea was never to encourage home ownership. The deduction was put in place prior to World War I when the first federal income was implemented. Policy makers at the time made all interest payments deductible to soften the impact of the new federal income tax. As an added caveat, there was very little home financing at the time.
Some may argue that even given the historic rationale for the deduction that over time it has morphed into a critical element to encourage home ownership.
Not really. If you doubt that just look north. Canada in 2006 had a home ownership rate of 68.4 percent based on their national census. In the United States, census data in 2008 put home ownership at 67.8 percent. Canada does not have a home mortgage interest deduction. The United States does.
Our nation’s home ownership rate isn’t much different than other industrialized nations of which many don’t provide mortgage deductions.
…
Other industrialized nations have free basic medical care, cheaper universities and better all around social services.
It will be interesting to see whether the NAR’s disinformation and lobbying campaign carries the day on the MID.
Mortgage interest deduction: Can US debt panel keep it on the chopping block?
The mortgage interest tax deduction is cherished by many Americans as the path to homeownership. But the co-chairmen of the US debt panel say it should be rolled back.
Debt Commission co-chairmen Erskine Bowles (l.) and former Wyoming Sen. Alan Simpson, speak to the media on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday. The two chairmen said Thursday that the mortgage interest tax deduction should be rolled back.
The FIRE sector is not going to allow this.
The list of top political donors over the past 20 years:
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php
I’m shocked, SHOCKED.
Guest column: Eliminate deduction on mortgage interest
Updated 11:00 pm
GARY L. MAYDEW is a retired accounting professor, College of Business, Iowa State University.
December 2, 2010
President Obama’s budget deficit reduction commission has proposed partially eliminating the deduction for mortgage interest. What would be the impact of eliminating this deduction?
To answer that question, I examined Statistics of Income for 2008 tax returns (the latest year available). Of the more than 142 million returns filed in 2008, only about 38 million (less than 27 percent) took a deduction for mortgage interest. As you might guess, the benefits of the mortgage interest deduction are heavily concentrated in the upper income classes. (The chart at right shows such concentration.)
How much in tax do the top income groups save by deducting mortgage interest? A recent Wall Street Journal article estimated the average tax savings of those in the top 1 percent to be $5,393. Based on the data I compiled, that estimate seems very conservative. Taxpayers with adjusted gross income of $500,000 should have had a marginal tax rate of 35 percent. Thus, even the lower rich ($500,000 to $1 million) should have saved an average of $10,028 from deducting their mortgage interest.
In addition to making our income tax slightly more progressive, eliminating the mortgage interest deduction could have other beneficial impacts:
- Increased mobility. To the extent that removing the mortgage interest deduction would decrease the rate of home ownership, the ability of household to move without being tethered to a house would increase;
- Less debt. The mortgage interest deduction, by reducing the after-tax cost of home ownership, encourages people to buy larger homes and incur more debt than they otherwise would; and
- Better allocation of resources. In the 1990s and especially the first decade of the 2000s we allocated too much of our nation’s resources to housing and not enough to infrastructure. The average size of houses built in the 1950s was less than 1,200 square feet. In 2006 the average new home size was 2,649 square feet. This misallocation of resources is also illustrated by employment in construction. Employment in the construction and extraction industries rose from 5.2 percent in 2000 to almost 6 percent in 2008 (the housing crisis has since caused it to fall sharply).
…
Calif. vs. Texas in manufacturing jobs:
December 3rd, 2010, by Jan Norman, small-business columnist OC Register
The 1,200 lost jobs are on top of the 631,000 manufacturing jobs California lost from 2001 to 2010, CMTA says, based on data from the Employment Development Dept.
I just went to buy some scrubs at a shop in San Bernardino in July. Went there two days ago, they had packed up and went to Texas. They manufactured the scrubs right there in the IE (Aviator Clothing Company). I guess I will buy on line. Just one more company leaving this state.
A large manufacturer of Pocket Knives moved from San Diego to North Idaho about 5 years ago. I had the opportunity to talk to the CEO shortly after they moved to NI. The guy itemized the expected savings and the list was astounding. He told me that he expected to save almost $1 million/year just in Workmans Comp Premiums. Other big savings, State Income Tax, property tax, power costs, wage rates, UI premiums, the list seemed endless.
I remember reading that story. ISTR that the northern Idaho town that they moved to was just thrilled to have them. And that they’d surely pick up a lot of local customers.
The GOP and democrats are so full of sh*t.
—-
With Republicans about to take control of the U.S. House, expect to hear more stories like this: Secret talks between the White House and GOP leaders.
Neither side has said much publicly about the negotiations, but news reports indicate that Obama aides are willing to extend the George W. Bush tax cuts for wealthy taxpayers in exchange for an extension of unemployment benefits and new forms of stimulus spending.
Wow, “tax cuts” for everybody, extension of benefits, and new spending. We’ll have this deficit licked in no time.
I’m still shocked that no Dem countered the Rep cry to “pay” for further unemployment benefits by not extending tax cuts to the wealthy. Disclosure–I’m for not extending either.
I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine.
Can the fed continue to print more money so goldman and jp morgan have more cash to trade stocks amongst each other so it appears we have a recovering market?
I saw a great graph of the feds treasury purchases and SPY.Pretty much a direct relationship.the more tresuries the fed buys from primary dealers the more cash they have to buy stock in NLFX.
Is this legal?
“When the
presidentFed does it, that means that it is not illegal.”Notice the pattern
1. The unemployed and poor get money
2. The elite get money
3. The middle class and upper middle class get the bill.
#3 is false: My great grandchildren get the bill
The birthrate is way down. There aren’t going to be any great-grandchildren to give the bill to.
That’s what amnesty is for, my friend.
San Diego joins in U.S. home price dip
But area was still up year-over-year
By Roger Showley
Tuesday, November 30, 2010 at 1:10 p.m.
San Diego, as well as other key metro areas, saw home prices dip in the latest, widely watched Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller Home Price Index issued Tuesday.
The September report had San Diego down 1 percent from August to September, a slightly worse decline than the .7 percent drop for all 20 metro areas.
It was the second straight decline locally after 15 months of increase and signaled a possible double-dip if the trend line continues.
…
Shapell buys half of Carlsbad ranch; plans 700 homes
211 acres went for more than $30 million, a sign home building is picking up
By Roger Showley
Thursday, December 2, 2010 at 12:43 p.m.
The 211-acre western half of Carlsbad’s Robertson Ranch has been sold for more than $30 million to Los Angeles developer Shapell Homes in a sign of a revival of home building in San Diego County.
Shapell plans to build 680 homes, starting in late-2013, on the property is located north of El Camino Real, west of Cannon Road and south of Tamarack Avenue on the eastern side of Carlsbad.
…
“Shapell plans to build 680 homes, starting in late-2013…”
Another “starkitecture” community. Ugh!
Focus on the big picture, which is that by sopping up demand, new home supply of any size or shape, no matter how fugly, helps make overall prices more affordable.
680 homes on 211 acres, take out roads and public space, is standard 1/4 acre homes. Now, as long as the things aren’t McMansions, it might actually be livable.
PB - Thanks for the wakeup call. You’re right.
oxide- That firm builds McMansions with no personality, imho, stacked on top of each other (stucco canyons). Hopefully, they are thinking one-story homes. The wasted space for grandiose common area is usual for them.
The upside is really nice community shopping centers accompany their PUD’s. They do great Power Centers w/ grocery anchors.
Oh no, you gotta have mandated common area AKA “open space” to sit deserted, barren and unused. Around here the HOA’s have to hire someone to take care of noxious weed infestations that a guy on a riding mower could control on 1/4-acre lot.
In Montana,
I love open space, don’t get me wrong. It’s the way they design the open space, and hit the homeowner up to pay for the maintenance. They leave vertical areas as open space, and cement and “fakescape” the rest. Hardscape isn’t open space to me. I like it left natural without walking paths (cement) and landscaping. Where we owned, they tore down the mature trees and planted new ones (city didn’t like to trim the beautiful mature ones). I’ve lived in that muck.
“Where we owned, they tore down the mature trees and planted new ones (city didn’t like to trim the beautiful mature ones).”
Ugh..I can see lots of common area with trails in truly nice places with natural woods, wetlands, etc. but just barren, alkaline scrub? Nah.
I fell for that too. I was thinking “wow, not too bad on the lot sizes” but now I bet they wind up being overrun with 4000 sq ft lots and 3000 sq ft houses.
I have a 15,000 sq ft lot and it feels SMALL. I don’t know what people do on <5k lots.
sfbubblebuyer
I owned a stucco canyon McMansion on 10,000 sq ft lot and it’s not the size of the lot per se, it’s the lack of privacy. My neighbors knew what was on our Bar-B-Q and could walk on their bedroom balcony and see our pool area. Yuck!
In Montana,
I’m in So Ca. Evidently, you’ve seen some well developed PUD’s where there was some natural harmony left. “Montana” says it all. It’s beautiful there.
That’s $142K per acre……undeveloped.
No water shortage in San Diego Co check
Santa Barbra Co and Montery Co use water shortages to limit growth
Carlsbad, the Irvine of North County. Soon they’ll have to expand the El Camino Real into a major interstate.
Economic Numvers: Worse than expected? Better than expected? Every roll is a winner when you have Bernanke as the Dealer. Everybody wins!! 10AM: dow UP a couple points.
Numvers, I like that. The PTB don’t provide us with “numbers”, its “numvers”. Kind of like when they sell “krab” meat at the grocery store.
Its all good.
Kind of like when they sell “krab” meat at the grocery store.
I never had any krabs.
Three foreclosed San Diego hotels up for sale
By Lori Weisberg
Thursday, December 2, 2010 at 6 a.m.
The 176-room Courtyard San Diego Old Town is one of three bank-owned hotels offered for sale by lender Mass Mutual.
San Diego hotels for sale
* Holiday Inn San Diego Downtown: 220 rooms, 1,500 square feet of meeting space
* Courtyard San Diego Old Town: 176 rooms, 4,900 square feet of meeting space
* Holiday Inn Express Old Town San Diego: 125 rooms, 2,000 square feet of meeting space
Three San Diego hotels that fell into foreclosure earlier this year are now up for sale as part of a portfolio of eight bank-owned properties located in Southern California and Utah.
The three local hotels — the Courtyard by Marriott San Diego and Holiday
Inn Express San Diego, both in Old Town, and the Holiday Inn in downtown
San Diego — account for a little more than 500 rooms out of the nearly 2,000 on the market.
Also being sold are hotels in Manhattan Beach, Atlanta, Long Island, Salt Lake City and Provo, Utah.
…
The Precious™ popped right back up to $1400/oz after the latest Eurozone bailout.
Gold - 100 Oz (Comex)
Market open
$1,404
Change +14.60 +1.05%
Volume 90,222
Dec 3, 2010, 10:09 a.m.
Previous close $1,389
Seems as if the precious continues its inevitable upward fall, what with it being the next bubble and all…
It pops up again every time the Fed’s printing press accelerates. I suppose one possible outcome is the Fed fixes the dollar to $1400/oz of gold (or whatever level they decide to peg).
IMHO they have been attempting to suppress the price for years. Before TARP there was a (nearly) sure thing trade every month on gold due to suppression by some unseen force following the monthly trade defecit report.
“IMHO they have been attempting to suppress the price for years.”
They must be pretty miserably inept, then. So far as I can tell, gold going from $35/oz in the 1960s to $1400/oz today represents a dollar devaluation of (1-35/1400)*100% = (1-7/280)*100% = 97.5% over a fifty year period.
You can’t stem a rising tide.
Also, my point is in regard to a monthly cycle, and we don’t know that it wouldn’t be at a record price per ounce in real dollars as well if not for said intervention.
It pops up again every time the Fed’s printing press accelerates. I suppose one possible outcome is the Fed fixes the dollar to $1400/oz of gold (or whatever level they decide to peg).
Exactly how would they do that? I have a feeling that if they promised to pay out an ounce of gold for every $1400 turned in, their gold stock wouldn’t be likely to last very long, even assuming they have the amount they claim.
From FB:
This may be a rant, forgive me:
I seem to be hearing more and more frequently about the impossibility of finishing a four year degree without heavy and persistent student loan debt. I need to state that the responsibility for this situation in most all cases of families above the poverty line is poor planning and selfish behaviors.
Young parents who would like to avoid seeing their children face this burden down the line may wish to do the following: (feel free to add to my list)
1) spend less than you earn, avoid debt as if it were the plague.
2) Pay tithing and a generous fast offering. (or your personal equivalent)
3) If you are going to a movie go to the dollar theater or at least a matinee. Remember that the movie will still have the same action and dialogue when you rent it at Redbox for $1.
4) A restaurant that costs more than $10/person should be a very special occasion, not a weekly or daily habit.
5) A car with a purchase cost of $0.10 per mile driven over its lifetime (or less) may not be cool, but it will still normally get you where you want to go and will cost less to insure. (see #1 above)
6) Never, EVER, pay for a vacation using credit. If grandma lives 14 hours away by car you only fly if it actually saves you money over driving.
7) Don’t believe the lie that it is smart to carry mortgage debt for the tax deduction. How does paying $10K in interest to the bank and getting $3K discount on taxes make sense as good financial planning?
8) Pay your mortgage down as soon as possible. See # 1 and #7 above. How easy would it be to pay cash for kids college if when they get there one has no mortgage payment?
9) Push yourself to learn to take care of periodic maintenance items on your inexpensive car mention in #5 above. At a minimum learn to change the oil, replace brake pads, and change a battery and alternator. I don’t earn $60/hr. Why should a mechanic earn that amount for these simple jobs?
10) Cell phones are not necessary to sustain life, despite what the media pushes on you. It is not necessary that each member of the family have a cell phone nor that the phones in question be the latest and greatest models. The same applies to laptops.
11) Garage sales are your friend.
12) remember this quote from Dickens, “”Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.”
FWIW, (flame on)
Elizabeth Warren debunked your entire post in The Two Income Trap. Compared the price of a mortgage or health insurance, the rest is piddly winks, with the possible exception of the cell phone plans.
There are “pay as you go plans” that are only $10/3 months if you really need one “just in case”.
I’m living proof that there is something wrong with the conclusion reached in The two Income Trap.
Married, 5 kids, first house bought with single income of $11/hr. in 1991.
One hint to how I did it was that I didn’t buy my house in Santa Monica.
dude
5 Kids! Wow, an intelligent American who reproduced that many offspring. That makes me happy.
My husband is 1 of 10. Most of his siblings (including himself) are college grads and all have a sense of family that money can’t buy. Kudos to you and the Mrs.
I am one of nine, you will be assimilated.
We love kids and fully expect to enjoy our granddchildren as well.
What I propose and have thus far succeeded in doing has not been easy but the result seems to be worth it.
I’ll probably get flamed for this one as well but we have also produce bi-literate offspring (Spanish/English) We accomplished this in large part by reading the scriptures out loud every day as a goal.
So far each of the girls has received a 5 on the Spanish AP and my two college girls so far tested out of 16 semester credits of Spanish courses. There’s more than one way to skin a tuition bill.
Also, the movie Idiocracy was a horror flick to me, but unfortunately most likely far too accurate. I don’t expect it will take more than 100 years more though.
Hey my parents gave me…..wait for it……nothing. They bought boats and motorcycles, horse back riding lessons etc but did not have anything put away for my education or my wedding.
I got through it just fine. I went to work starting at 15. Had multiple jobs every summer. Held a job off campus while taking classes. Got the grades to earn a few scholarships. When I got the first job in the 80s recession, a position created for me due to a business I put together in college, my bosses and sales people repeatedly remarked at my high energy and level of productivity. Raises and promotions came accordingly. I have full faith in my children they can achieve the same.
Do any parents put money away for thier daughters wedding now a days?
Pretty hard to do when so many daughters have serial weddings.
A friend of mine’s sister was getting remarried - again - and her long-suffering father was heard to mention at the reception “these Linda weddings are becoming an annual event”.
So what you do think of Linda’s father? He is a super-nice, great father, or is he a chump?
I would think that the custom of parents paying for their daughters’ weddings should only apply to the first wedding.
There should be only one “wedding.” The others should be at the courthouse.
“I would think that the custom of parents paying for their daughters’ weddings should only apply to the first wedding.”
It does. And guests traditionally did not give gifts for subsequent weddings either, but just try bringing THAT up in an etiquette forum these days.
I have money saved for my daughter’s weddings if and when they marry.
I have full faith in my children they can achieve the same.
You need to check out the tuition costs of the kinds of college that your kids might attend. Tuition has been rising much more quickly than the general rate of inflation for 30 or 40 years now. Even formerly cheap state universities are raising tuition sharply in many states as taxpayers can’t afford to contribute as much as they did in the past.
The ability of a student to work also depends on the school and the major. If you major in science or engineering at a good, challenging university, it’s not really possible to work more then about 10 or 15 hours per week without it starting to affect your grades.
Yesterday evening, I was at a gathering of local photographers. One of them used to teach at Brooks Institute, a photo school in Santa Barbara, CA.
The guy said that the students paid something like $100k for their degrees. I was tempted to say something like “Yeesh!” But I kept The Troublemaker closed and locked.
What’s worse, a lot of these kids can’t find photographer jobs. And, to hear it from some of the other fotogs at this gathering, it’s not easy to make a FT living in the field.
WTH! College degrees in photography???
WTH! College degrees in photography???
Have you tried to work one of the newer digital lens caps lately?
My brother got a degree in “photo-journalism” from San Jose State back in 1970. It took him 5 years since he’s not the brightest one in the family.
He’s worked for print newspapers since that time, barely scraping by with not much more than minimum-wage salaries. I’ve tried and tried for 30 years to get him to consider a career change, but he won’t listen to reason.
Now he’s a hack photographer for what’s little more than a “shopping advertising newspaper” in the middle of nowhere. But he still puffs himself up, and preens “I’m a creative artistic photo-journalist”. Oy Veh.
Relatives. You don’t get to pick them.
Az Slim
We live down the coast from Santa Barbara, where Brooks Institute is located. My friends who sent their kids there, have funded too many soft degrees per kid. None of these kids have real skills, and are big time creative dreamers. That’s great if you are really talented and will work at it. One friend’s daughter has 3 low demand degrees and is working as a waitress now. Also, that school since has closed, but if I recall correctly, was under investigation for promising placement help, and didn’t deliver.
Reminds me of the Paralegal Schools during the last major economic contraction. The feds were handing out grants left and right. The schools cleaned up. Most students weren’t qualified to get jobs.
My brother got a degree in “photo-journalism” from San Jose State back in 1970. It took him 5 years since he’s not the brightest one in the family.
He’s worked for print newspapers since that time, barely scraping by with not much more than minimum-wage salaries. I’ve tried and tried for 30 years to get him to consider a career change, but he won’t listen to reason.
Many years ago, I had a boss whose husband was a commercial photographer here in Tucson. She made the lion’s share of the money in that family, and even that was enough. (They had a toddler son, and you know what little kids cost.)
Any-hoo, her family’s never-ending struggles to make ends meet were a frequent theme around our office. And, one fine vacation day when I was visiting my mom and dad, I made the mistake of repeating this sorry theme to my mother.
Mom’s retort: “Doesn’t he have any other skills?”
I got her message loud and clear. It was this:
Slim, don’t try to make a fulltime living out of photography unless you have a very nice income happening somewhere else. Which means that you’d best diversify your skills.
Mike, if they take a year off to accumulate savings to pay for a 3rd or 4th year so be it. The fact the American public is reduced to full commitment to any price asked is why prices keep rising. They’ve got you, don’t they? As long as a majority refuses to walk away be prepared to dig deeper and deeper, just like housing. You have to remember the US has been in an education bubble and Mom and Dad paying all 4 years for every kid out there is not the way it used to be nor will it be for long going forward.
A friend w/a PhD was mostly educated through his employers. Same w/his wife. They didn’t have their own money for their education back then but what they did have was a proven intelligence in an area w/a shortage of hirable workers. My husband was partially educated through his employer. He’s currently working on his 3rd degree. We pay for parking. A good friend of mine could gain additional education through her husband’s employer. (yeah, he’s a guy in high places) Yeah, you read that right. The employer pays for the spouse’s education. That’s how much they want to keep her husband happy.
Do people think these programs will go away? All I hear about is how American skillsets don’t match the need. Go find out what’s needed and get yourself in a position to meet the people who will open doors and get a base. I’m w/Ben on this one. I wish I was young again. I see opportunity all over the place and wish I was in a different stage in life where I could so easily work it. Of course, if I was that young I might not already have the contacts that give me the insight. That’s what your parents do owe you: guidance and insight.
I agree with this plan, but it should be a family standard from early age. In our case we let the girls know from an early age that paying for college was our responsibility unless they flunked out or got married. They have known this plan from early childhood.
We encourage high grades and striving for excellence by telling them that a full ride scholarship means we buy them a car for graduation. I believe in positive reinforcement.
Dude, don’t count on academic scholarships. I’m finding out that very few private schools offer full scholarships. My daughter is in the top 5% of her class with a perfect 36 act score (reading) and a 33 total score. So far, one mid-level school has offered $16,000 ( $53,000 tuition room & board). The top state schools are $19,000/yr total. I have 80 grand left, after my older daughter went to a state school. I won’t let her take out more than $20,000 in student loans. I won’t re-mortgage or raid my 401K. Those are my rules. We’ll see if these privates pony up. Btw, if everyone followed sound financial rules, tuitions would be much lower.
No doubt, we don’t count on scholarships, sorry I gave that impression.
The offer of the car is incentive to get excellent grades during HS in the face of the already present understanding that we will pay for their schooling.
“it’s not really possible to work more then about 10 or 15 hours per week without it starting to affect your grades”.
My husband’s an engineer. He worked full time while attending school until my son was born. Then I supported both of us while he finished up at school. His commute from mid MA to Boston was making it difficult to get there on time so I told him quit work; I’d support both of us. Then he had 4 mos of a collicky baby. He had A’s until the collicky baby.
CA, see my response just above this. I agree that this is an acceptable method as long as it is spelled out up front to the rug rat in question.
I think 10 to 15 hours of work each week is not an unreasonable request from parents. It would help the student value the process and maybe make for more studying and less partying.
I cringe to think that my kids wouldn’t have my support for college if that is the path they choose. It would break my heart to think they wanted to achieve more and I wasn’t in a position to facilitate that.
Also, I expect my daughters will eventually find that special someone who makes their heart go pitter-pat, and by selfish motive I’d rather that individual be a university type and not a CC type. Snobbish? Maybe, but it isn’t like I’m telling them to reject based on skin color or something of that type.
Forgot to mention stop buying cheap so much Chinese crap.
13.) Avoid divorce
Beg to differ. Depending on what kind of person you are married to, divorce can be the best financial decision you can make.
Every tax season I bring it up to my wife. Living in sin = way less taxes for us.
How about, “Marry well, marry once.”
13. Don’t anyone get sick. EVER.
Actually interesting you should mention that, I came up with a number 13 as well today that is related and should probably be higher on the list.
Vices are not nices.
Check out The Five-Year Party by Craig Brandon. Most college students take almost 6 years to graduate these days which adds a huge tuition burden. He advises that parents carefully gauge their child’s interest in studying (or partying), and perhaps even taking a year or two off, a Gap Year, to gain some maturity, or gasp, using the money to start a business if they are mad geniuses who don’t have the patience for school.
Big posting day for me apparently, I’d love comment both positive and negative on the following personal item:
I am considering blowing a whistle. It is a regulatory issue involving customers at the federal level as well as various states and internationals.
As I reason it out I have two things stopping me:
1) I like my job. I don’t need it financially but it challenges me and I am doing something that really makes a positive difference in the lives of the persons who receives the benefit of our product.
2) I don’t know if the potential damage to the company could be overcome, whether those who benefit from our product would be able to find a suitable alternative supplier, in short, does the risk of harm created by the regulatory issue outweigh the good that the product does for end users.
Three reasons for the act:
1) I may be in line for prosecution in the end if those who are acting dishonestly are able to set me up to fall. Remote, but possible.
2) It is difficult for me to watch dishonesty rewarded.
3) I can’t help but think about the damage caused if the regulatory compliance deficiency actually results in a catastrophic product failure. (see #2 above in the pros)
Conundrum?
“Conundrum?”
Join the club.
(In all fairness, you are already in…)
Yup. I already dropped a dime.
No whistleblower ever goes unpunished. Seems like nobody likes a rat, even if he’s right.
It’s as if the PTB want whistleblowing, but don’t want too much of it; either because they are embarrased that they didn’t catch the problem first, and/or they REALLY don’t want to know about the size of the problem.
I’ve seen/been involved a few times in something like this, and it seems that the whistleblower ends up getting hammered as bad or worse than the actual bad actor.
My father, faced with a similar situation back in the mid-1970s, elected to refuse to cooperate with malfeasance, and was fired.
He elected not to blow the whistle, to maintain his employability.
It was a moral compromise between obligations to society and obligations to his young family, for whom he was the sole breadwinner in the deep mid-1970s recession. Ultimately, my family had to relocate half way across the country for him to be able to get a job.
And he probably wouldn’t have been able relocate at all these days. Your father’s reputation for “not being a team player” would reach both coasts through the internet.
1) I may be in line for prosecution in the end if those who are acting dishonestly are able to set me up to fall. Remote, but possible.
Is there an anonymous way you can let those who are acting dishonestly know that someone knows what they are doing and if they don’t stop THEN the whistle will be blown.
For example is it possible that one of your many customers’ or suppliers’ employees could be on to the issue having learned from it from their position as a customer/supplier and not from your position inside the company doing the wrongs?
Maybe as a customer/vendor/supplier/service provider/accountant/another employee in your company etc. they would not know everything that YOU would know as an employee BUT maybe they could know just enough of the scam to get the authorities attention if informed.
Then you being in the company doing the wrong, you will know if the wrongs have been righted but they won’t know it was you behind it.
Good plan, I’ll add it to my pondering…
I may be in line for prosecution in the end if those who are acting dishonestly are able to set me up to fall. Remote, but possible.
I guess the first didn’t go through.
Dude,
Is there any chance that you can anonymously contact the wrong doers in your company and make it seem that your are someone from one of your customers’ companies or/vendors’/suppliers/service providers who knows about something or suspects something about the scam and will go to the authorities unless it stops immediately?
Would anyone from outside your company be able to know about it enough to threaten to have it stop? This “person from another company” would not know the whole scam and would even throw out some wrong info to make it seem like it was not someone from your company.
Then you would know pretty fast if the scam in your company had stopped.
Thanks all for the comments, I value the straightforward nature of the discussion here. (except the partisan bickering)
Dude, you should not participate in wrong doing.
You do not need to be the police, or a martyr, unless you want to be.
You can take my father’s route and refuse to do something wrong and be fired, or leave. Or you can blow the whistle.
But consider what my Dad said. Once you are known as a whistleblower, even the honest won’t hire you, because they are afraid someone else in the organization is doing something wrong, and you’ll end up creating a big mess for them.
Yes, understood. I guess I am really fortunate that I could leave the job and retire early if it came to that.
I won’t ever do anything dishonest intentionally, and I’ve taken a lifetime worth of graduate seminars on CYA. My current path just gets frustrating because the PTB in the firm would prefer it seems to turn a blind eye or attempt to successfully pull off a firing squad in-the-round.
You should see my journal entries…
“1) I may be in line for prosecution in the end if those who are acting dishonestly are able to set me up to fall. Remote, but possible.”
No. You WILL be prosecuted AND persecuted. Despite the laws, this will destroy your career and probably your life.
And you better have enough saved for a GOOD lawyer.
Now you know why so many companies and organizations get away with this crap. It’s you against their army.
The best way is to drop the dime, ANONYMOUSLY, to the parties getting screwed letting them know they ARE getting screwed. Make damn sure you CYA ten ways from Sunday and maintain your anonymity.
Let them do the legwork and take the heat.
Thanks EF, see my quip above about CYA.
I like some others here work within the structure of the Asian mafia, so I already have two strikes against me.
My reading of the WB act and subsequent investigation would indicate that there are many, many vultures, er, lawyers who will represent one if there is money to be made, and since the government can claw back funds paid to firm that commit fraud there is certainly money to be made.
Acquiring counsel would naturally be my first action item if I decide to proceed.
Obama’s deficit plan fails in committee on bipartisan vote. Bummer.
Get ready for inflation.
Or deflation?
Or Frost, Fire and Ice?
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
Robert Frost
Today was another good day to sell gold - had plenty of time left in the day after getting walked out from the place where I finished my contract, so went to my stash and went to the coin dealer
Today was another good day to sell gold - had plenty of time left in the day after getting walked out from the place where I finished my contract, so went to my stash and went to the coin dealer
Yes, it’s always a good day to get rid of your insurance. Surely nothing bad can happen with the Fed on the case, right?
This is surprising. It isn’t often you see a custom built 4000 sq footer offered as a for sale by owner.
http://syracuse.craigslist.org/reo/2090191427.html
Jeez…. is there no shame anymore? I’d be embarrassed to live in that shack.
Yeah, the last thing you want to do in this economy is to make other people think you have money.
i have money…cause i save.
Hmm, I was wondering why “walking distance to shopping” was a selling point on at 680k+ property with a three car garage?
PS- I am glad to see that kitchen has a porcelain rooster, it would make Dave Ramsey proud.
I was looking at the picture and really thought I was in the Hamptons instead of some forgotten, jobless, crappy city with no opportunity like Syracuse.
“I was looking at the picture and really thought I was in the Hamptons instead of some forgotten, jobless, crappy city with no opportunity like Syracuse.”
I nominate this quote for the HBB Hall of Fame, December 2010.
The “My Three Son’s” facade seems to be deeply rooted in the American psyche (Same color too!)
http://www.amoeba.com/dynamic-images/blog/Eric_B/myThreeSons.JPG
“Syracuse” has the beautiful Sedgewick and a few other comfortable areas. But mostly you wouldn’t find a place like this in the city. And much of what you do find is well, I’m sorry, but I think frightening. Go out 10 miles. These places are everywhere. You don’t even need a good school district.
Go to Cazenovia or Skaneateles. Ya know during the 20s these were the summer locations of many of NYs grand families who made their fortunes in NYC. Several families still maintain ownership since that era.
So did anyone notice I posted this house is an REO?
One of the pitched roofs must be having babies. Shoot if before it multiplies further.
His “custom” house had a plan set named “The Hamptons”.
Um… that’s not a custom house.
“Country” style and “mansion” do not go together.
Awww….in my soon to be upcoming post I posted a link id’d in the headline as for sale by owner but as I pushed “add comment” I saw in the link it was really a REO.
Yesterday one of PBs articles said this:
Canada’s central bank, the Bank of Canada, was created in 1935 in part because of pressure from the rest of the world.
I’m not clear on how “the world” pressure countries that don’t necessarily need a central bank into accepting one. Not sure why anyone cares what “the world thinks”…except for the people within the country who think they can use one to make/skim more money from the rest of the population than they would otherwise be able to.
The handful of countries that don’t have a central bank are all considered terrorist states by the PTB. Iraq used to be one, but now they have a central bank; one of the first things the US set up.
no offense ben…but do you have a link for this?
I’ve heard rumblings of conspiracy theory in that area, but know almost nothing about it. Are there any good books that address the issue from that angle (no CB = terrorist)?
Orwellian isn’t it? We label countries terrorist when it’s the US that terrorizes an entire region through it’s proxy Israel. And before you blind goobers start pandering for Israel, it is the Israeli govt who are that bad guys. Israeli citizens are not the problem and very respectable folks like Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn have made this known for many years now.
A Message From Transport Canada - Rick Mercer Report
Brilliant.
Full Body Scanner -what to wear under your clothes
What next? I bet people stop tipping 18%. Maybe 10% or not at all. No law says you have to and everyone is cutting back. 8 out of 10 people I know are living off less than they were 5 years ago, a lot less. Shops are closing, rents are dropping even in the most desirable cities. I know I live in the happiest city in America according to a new book, #4 place in the world.
I tip handsomely whenever I eat out, which is 2 or 3 times a month in average. That makes it a lot easier I guess. 30% to 40% is my range.
Dated a couple of women who waited tables and both said that seeing a large tip always made their days no matter how sad they were. It kind of stayed with me.
My waitressing days paid for college. They have to really screw up to not get 20%. More at Christmas. Much more if they were really good to me.
In my mind if you can’t afford the proper tip for service you shouldn’t be ordering that much in the first place.
I can remember when 10% was the tip amount.
It seems in a few years it will be more than the cost of the meal.
I give decent tips because I figure that’s part of their income . If I sit at a table longer than normal I give extra because I figure I’m taking away the opportunity for them to make more money .If I get really
really good service I give a little extra ,especially around holidays .
That being said ,I don’t think it’s unacceptable for a party who is low on funds to give a 10% tip and I’m sure that restaurant staff expects
that a certain % of people can only afford that lower amount .
Brazilians don’t generally tip. 10% is added. Sometimes I give a little more but if you give them a lot more they think you’re one of those strange gringos.
In taxis if the meter reads 10.30 you give them 11 so they make like a 40 cent tip. This is what they expect.
In USA usually 15-20% if service is OK.
A woman who works with my wife waits tables PT at the Local Outback. She claims her tip income is off by more that half due to price reductions of menu items, people buying less food and drinks and people tipping a lower percentage of the tab. Its gotten to the point she is wondering if the gross income is worth the time spent.
My friend’s sister works at a night club in a bowling alley, and she takes home more in tips than I gross.
My wife used to have a group that came in once a week and tipped her with a small bible repeatedly. If it had been me there would have been some spilled hot soup or coffee.
I would be saving the bibles and handing them back to them each time as ‘complimentary hand wipes’.
Hey folks,
This is my last day on the job in Los Angeles. I start my new job on Monday December 6 in Tampa, Florida. I’m grateful for the client to allow me to work to the end of my two week notice.
There’s always some degree of fear and some shortage of confidence going into a new job as a consultant.
1700 miles from my Phoenix home, but it will be nice to make new connections and check out Florida - never been there.
This is far better than nothing. I found out the current client is asking contractors to not work for two or three months starting January. I did not see that coming, but I was told indirectly that I get paid too much.
Good luck, Bill in Tampa.
Keep us posted.
Good luck. Lots of great people in Fla, and lots of scammers.
I don’t think we have to worry about Bill and scammers. Scammers are the ones we should worry about.
thank you
Thank you!
Good luck, Bill. Keep us posted.
thank you and my name as someone caught earlier will be Bill in Tampa, not to be confused with “Bill in Carolina!”
Good luck Bill.
check out Florida - never been there
That urban myth about FL gators in the golf course water traps,…it’s not a myth, …ask me how I know?
Be safe Mr. Bill in Tampa!
Yep,good luck Bill .
Thanks everyone!
As I left the office building (my approved timesheet in hand), and after I handed over my badge, my supervisor asked me which company I was going to. I told him. The company is sort of a competitor and in negotiations with the LA firm on some engineering work. The supervisor’s look was surprise. But he was nice and said if I need to look for work in the second quarter of 2011 give him a call.
I did sign a NDA, however you are not bound to not work at a different company. Their legal eagles will sort it out on both sides I think.
Good luck and have a safe trip.
Thank you for your wishes!
* DECEMBER 3, 2010, 1:24 P.M. ET
OIL FUTURES: Crude Hits Fresh Two-Year High, Tops $89/Bbl
By Jerry A. DiColo
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)–Crude futures reached fresh two-year highs Friday as a weak report on U.S. employment failed to overshadow concerns that global oil supplies may be tightening.
Light, sweet crude for January delivery recently traded $1.07, or 1.2%, higher at $89.07 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude on the ICE futures exchange recently traded 55 cents higher at $91.24 a barrel, after hitting its highest price since October 2008.
Nonfarm payrolls rose by 39,000 in November as private-sector employers added just 50,000 jobs, the Labor Department said Friday, well below economists’ average estimates calling for a 144,000 increase. A separate survey showed the unemployment rate unexpectedly rose to 9.8% last month.
The reports suggested there remains underlying weakness in the economy, but oil rebounded quickly following the closely-watched data.
“The jobs number was a two-edged sword,” said Jim Ritterbusch, head of energy-advisory firm Ritterbusch and Associates. “It forced some weakening in the dollar.”
Meanwhile, he said, “Supplies are tightening a bit…We’ve got demand growth taking place globally, and it’s proving a bit higher than previously expected. And in the last few weeks here in the U.S. we’ve have a raft of economic releases that have exceeded expectations.”
Despite Friday’s report, economic data in the U.S. have been improving, and demand in China, the world’s second-largest crude consumer, isn’t expected to fall despite the government’s efforts to slow the economy.
U.S. inventories peaked at 27-year highs in September as well, and have mostly fallen over the past two months.
“We’ve spent two years where the market has ignored current fundamentals and focused on future fundamentals,” said Dominick Chirichella, an oil analyst at the Energy Management Institute. “But what we’ve seen is that the inventory levels, in the U.S. and globally, are starting to destock. We still have plenty of supplies, but it is certainly moving towards a more normal direction.”
U.S. inventories peaked at 27-year highs in September
Demand Down,…
SupplyPrice UP,yeah WTF is going on with oil prices? Is goldman rigging the market again.Even donald trump was talking about tankers full of oil sitting out in the middle of the ocean holding back supply.The trumpster is thinking of running for president now.
Back in the old days (pre-2007) they always had an excuse like “refineries changing over to making heating oil”, or “transition to summer-blend fuels” Right before major holidays, just like clockwork.
And we’d have the traditional “The government is investigating price-fixing” Kabuki; and of course, tree months later on page 23 of the paper, they’d announce that no collusion could ever be found.
In 2008, no BS stories to be seen; they didn’t care whether anyone thought it was speculation or not. That was when Bush was still in office, and they thought Obama the Socialist might put an end to it……..silly them.
Now that’s “taxation” without representation!
That’s the beauty of the inflation tax. Nobody actually announces this form of taxation without representation; it just suddenly appears, like a twister from a clear blue sky which ‘no one could have seen coming.’
Let me rephrase that slightly:
No politician can be blamed for an inflation tax. They don’t even have to decide to levy one — it just happens like magic.
4 in 10 Broward home sales this summer involved a foreclosure
December 02, 2010|By Paul Owers, Sun Sentinel
Homes in some stage of foreclosure accounted for a large portion of South Florida sales during the third quarter, a trend that likely will hinder the housing market indefinitely, analysts say.
About 42 percent of Broward County homes sold during the July-through-September period were in default, scheduled for auction or bank-owned, RealtyTrac Inc. said Thursday.
In Florida, Broward was second only to Miami-Dade County with 4,688 foreclosure-related sales in the quarter, down 6 percent from the second quarter.
Roughly 31 percent of Palm Beach County home sales involved a foreclosure during the period. The county had 2,303 foreclosure sales in the third quarter, up 2 percent from the second quarter.
Nationally, a quarter of all home sales involved a distressed property.
Is that the county where the retarded boomers couldn’t figure out the ballots with the chads? They ended up voting for Buchannen rather than igore!!! hahahahahaha
* December 3, 2010, 2:02 PM GMT
The Central Banking Inflation Paradox
By Alen Mattich
The Bank of England chose it. So did the Federal Reserve. As did central banks across developing economies. And now the European Central Bank is being backed into the same decision.
What is it? To pursue inflation as an economic remedy.
Central bankers still offer up the pretence that they are committed to price stability. And, no doubt, they think they can deliver–once, of course, they’ve allowed inflation to do the necessary job of putting their economies on a stable course.
But this is a fiction, in part because there’s a paradox at work here.
In order to prevent the deflationary episode they all fear, central bankers have to convince investors they are aggressively pursuing inflation. But this isn’t credible if investors continue to believe central banks will stick to their price-stability mandates. And without a credible policy to pursue inflation, deflation remains a risk.
Central banks can’t unilaterally abandon these mandates without risking political wrath and loss of independence. So their choices are limited.
Perhaps a commitment to price targeting might work. But it is unlikely to, for the same reason that once inflation begins to exceed the central bank’s target rate, the central bank knows deflation is no longer a risk and therefore it has no incentive to pursue price-level targeting to its promised conclusion. And investors know this as well.
So how do central banks credibly pursue a high-inflation policy while at the same time committing to price stability?
Simple. They create the circumstances under which investors think the central bank will have no control over inflation once it starts to take off.
…
So if you have a central bank such as the fed I guess that means you get to print more money everytime there is a hiccup in the economy.
I guess it SOL for countries that dont have a printing press.I guess the ECB has some people by the balls right?
“Central banking decisions boil down to who is made to pay for the huge debts that have been built up. Controlling inflation means making workers pay through unemployment. Allowing inflation to race away means making savers pay through a transfer of wealth.
Central bankers have chosen the latter.“
Is there a cartel between central banks?
Official or de facto?
correction
allowing inflation to race ahead means conservative investors and workers pay. Wages will not keep pace with inflation and are in fact falling. The ones who benefit from inflation are those that control natural resources.
Their policies won’t do any favors for the working man. It’s one thing to be merely employed and quite another to be gainfully employed.
market pulse
Dec. 3, 2010, 4:52 p.m. EST
CBS: Bernanke doesn’t rule out more bond-buys
Forget Bin Laden. The Bernake is the biggest threat to any law abiding, tax paying and living within their means, citizens of this country.
Come on Obama, ask for his resignation. You will get my vote.
When your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
The Fed has a mandate to promote full employment. Using monetary policy to promote employment is like using cocaine to promote health.
“Central banking decisions boil down to who is made to pay for the huge debts that have been built up.
Controlling inflation means making workers pay through unemploymentSound money means allowing savers to keep their savings. Allowing inflation to race away means making savers pay through a transfer of wealth.Fixed it for you.
Aaron Edelheit has invested $10m in foreclosed homes for his hedge fun and is renting them out. He made 8% last year after expenses.
(Diana Olick story on CNBC)
Another story in the whose buying quandry: Cororate relo’s. Just the other day a friend told me the transferring company would reimburse them a $50k loss on their home. Gives a bit more leeway when they’re making purchases during a transfer. Every company has its own guidelines but there are an awful lot of corporate relos going on in this location.
Too bad renters aren’t getting a $50K “transfer incentive”.
i watched “collapse” last night.
pretty interesting.
there is a part where michael ruppert alludes to the fact that what backs global currencies is the nation’s abilty to control oil.
i’ve always told my friends that the u.s. dollar is backed by the u.s. military…kind of the same thing.
Like “Rock, paper, scissors”
“Oil” beats “military”.
Just ask the Germans and Japanese.
military takes oil fields
they win every time
Like the Germans took the Baku oil fields during WWII? Or the Japanese took the Dutch oil fields in Indonesia?
9.8% Unemployment (officially)
Bunch of slackers. If the suits just tried a little harder, they could get it up to an even 10% by December 31.
Gimme a “U”, gimme an “S”, gimme an “A”……what does it spell????
FUBAR!
Like they keep telling the peons, gotta set those goals to keep everyone motivated.
Where will unemployment go when xmas is over?
Maybe we should start a HBB betting pool. Better yet, have a Trifecta:
-Unemployment Rate
-Months of unsold housing inventory
-Total of Bankster year end bonuses (in billions)
-Up
-Up
-Up
What do I win?
I think RAinB should continue his “Travel Log” series, to help our financial planning when the transition to Banana Republic is complete. Answering questions like:
-The cost and reliability of private security.
-Is there “do it yourself” security? Do they have anything like “Gun Depot”?
-The pros and cons of using armor plate vs. Kevlar panels.
-Are the major cities a reverse “Escape from New York” scenario, with the wealthy walled off in enclaves away from the peons. Do the wealthy get kidnapped and help for ransom frequently?. How much should someone budget for ransom?. Can you buy “kidnap insurance”?. Would Snake Plisskin be considered a “Loss Mitigation Specialist”?
Just keep us a few steps ahead of the herd. As they say, you don’t have to be the fastest gazelle, just don’t be the slowest.
Does anyone besides moi find the spectacle of Sarah Palin taking on Bernanke and Geithner bizarre beyond the pale?
Features December 1, 2010, 9:42PM EST
Bernanke and Geithner Fight Back
How the Federal Reserve chairman and Treasury Secretary are battling to defend the Fed’s latest moves—and preserve its independence
By Rich Miller
This Issue
magazine cover
December 6, 2010
Who Loves Ya, Baby?
On the morning of Nov. 4, two days after the midterm elections, Timothy Geithner was scheduled to fly to Kyoto for a dinner with Asian-Pacific finance ministers. At the last minute, Geithner postponed his trip; there was just too much going on in Washington. The dimensions of the electoral drubbing that President Barack Obama had taken were still sinking in when the Treasury Secretary arrived at the White House to plot strategy at the President’s cabinet meeting.
Obama then extended an olive branch to newly empowered Republican leaders, inviting them to meet later in the month. Geithner had no illusion that peace was breaking out. In fact, as he returned to the Treasury Dept. for a private lunch with Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, the next political battle was already taking shape.
Bernanke would be the new target.
…
On Nov. 8, Palin dragged Bernanke more directly into the fray. In a speech in Phoenix, she demanded that he “cease and desist” before his “pump-priming addiction” brought “permanently higher inflation.” On Nov. 15 a group of 23 mostly Republican economists, money managers, and former government officials sent an open letter to Bernanke arguing that the central bank’s bond purchases “risk currency debasement.” Two days after that the four Republican leaders in the House and Senate—John Boehner of Ohio, Eric Cantor of Virginia, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and Jon Kyl of Arizona—wrote to Bernanke to express their “deep concerns” over bond purchases that could lead to “hard-to-control, long-term inflation and potentially generate artificial asset bubbles.”
Ever since, Bernanke and Geithner have found themselves pitted against the Republicans and the Tea Party in a battle that could help determine the fate of the economy, Obama’s Presidency, and the Federal Reserve itself. Some of their Republican opponents, such as Pence and Tennessee Senator Bob Corker, want to strip the Fed of its mandate to pursue full employment and focus on price stability alone, which would make it harder to justify future rounds of quantitative easing. The most radical antagonists want to go further. Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and his father, Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.), argue for doing away with the central bank altogether. Forty-one percent of Republicans and 55 percent of Tea Party supporters believe the Fed should be abolished or radically overhauled, according to a Bloomberg National Poll conducted Oct. 7-10.
…
I’d buy front row seats for that debate.
It would be like what happens when you put two 1-year olds together; A lot of babbling, and you can tell that they are trying to communicate, but nobody can figure out WTF they are saying.
“Babble….babble….babble, dontcha know……babble…..Tea Party…..babble…….”
“Babble…..contained……babble……helicopters……babble….babble…”
“Does anyone besides moi find the spectacle of Sarah Palin taking on Bernanke and Geithner bizarre beyond the pale?”
The way you phrased it… yeah
Kinky.
I was not trying to be salacious — rather referring to the extreme intellectual gap between the Hockey Mom and these two politically and financially adept central bankers. The only reason she stands a chance in the competition is that many Americans are much closer to her intellectual plane than to the Fed governors.
I was not trying to be salacious — rather referring to the extreme intellectual gap between the Hockey Mom and these two politically and financially adept central bankers. The only reason she stands a chance in the competition is that many Americans are much closer to her intellectual plane than to the Fed governors.
I think the fact that she happens to be right may have something to do with it too.
And I say that as someone who has never noticed her being right about anything before this.
“right”
Just like a parrot can be right: ‘Polly wanna cracker’ (no offense to the HBB Polly intended!)
A list of top political donors 1989-2010:
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/list.php
Quite revealing.
I’d rather see the numbers from 2000-present.
Do these numbers include individual donations masking as corporations, like the Koch brothers?
You can do a search on the site. I typed in “Koch” and saw the following:
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.php?cycle=A&type=P&id=D000000186
That the top 15 all time highest political money contributors nearly give 100% to democrats and are nearly all unions or trial lawyers???
Whatever the unions spent, it obviously wasn’t enough……..
I just did a quick calculation:
1) Democrats received 60% of “Heavy Hitter” donations, 1.27 billion. Republicans received 40% of those donations, 844 million.
I copied the table into a text file, imported it into Excel (it’s tab delimited), and let Excel do its magic.
What happens when governments lose control of the printing of money:
The German Hyperinflation, 1922-1923
In the autumn of 1923, Lott Hendlich, a German widow in her fifties, returned to her native Frankfurt after an absence of more than four years in Switzerland. In 1919 she had gone to spend a few pleasant weeks in a Swiss village where her relatives lived. But almost immediately, Frau Hendlich broke her hip in a fall. During her long convalescence her chronic cough became worse, and the doctor attending her advised her that she was suffering from advanced tuberculosis. The months and years of her illness dragged on interminably even though her relatives were genuinely solicitous (they insisted on defraying all her expenses, including the fees of her doctor). At last, in September 1923, she was “cured” and considered well enough to return home. Her much longed-for homecoming soon became a nightmare.
In the stack of accumulated mail she found three letters from her bank; they delineated her ruin. The first–written in mid-1920 by a minor bank officer who had befriended her–advised her “to invest most of the funds in your rather substantial bank account” (amounting to over 600,000 marks, or the equivalent of more than $70,000 at the exchange rate prevailing in 1919). “It is my judgment,” the writer continued, “that the purchasing power of the mark will decline, and I suggest you try to guard against this through some suitable investment which we can discuss when you come into the bank.”
The next letter, dated in September 1922, and signed by another officer said, “It is no longer profitable for us to service such a small account as yours. Will you kindly withdraw your funds at the earliest opportunity?”
The third letter, dated several weeks before her return from Switzerland, announced, “Not having heard from you since our last communication, we have closed out your account. Since we no longer have on hand any small-denomination bank notes, we herein enclose a note for one million marks.”
With gathering panic Frau Hendlich looked at the envelope that had contained the letter and the million-mark note. She noticed that affixed to it there was a canceled postage stamp of one million marks. Her bank account–which four years before seemed large enough to provide her with a serene existence to the end of her days–had been utterly consumed by inflation and could no longer pay for an ordinary postage stamp.
“Her bank account–which four years before seemed large enough to provide her with a serene existence to the end of her days–had been utterly consumed by inflation and could no longer pay for an ordinary postage stamp.”
One particularly nasty potential turn of future events could leave many American retirees in similar straights.
One particularly nasty potential turn of future events could leave many American retirees in similar straits.
Luckily, the probability of that is only about 99%. The other 1%, of course, is the probability that there is a deflationary depression in which the banks go under and pensions are not paid.
Always remember, there is no means of preventing the contraction after a period of credit expansion. The only choice is whether the contraction is voluntary or as a result of the total destruction of the currency in question.
“The other 1%, of course, is the probability that there is a deflationary depression in which the banks go under and pensions are not paid.”
So in your world, the last twenty years of Japanese financial history was an extremely persistent rare event?
Germany had to pay reparations.
Thus all of it’s gold and foreign currancy were used for this.
I suspect most of the printed money went to the masses which then spent it.
So far all of the printed money is going to replace bad debt and pay large wall street bonuses. Not much is being lent or used to pay workers in relative terms.
A bit of history from The Des Moines Register, Iowa’s Hardest Years, Stories From The Farms During The Great Depression:
Economist Neil Harl of Iowa State University said the decade was “the worst period of civil disorder in the state’s history,…”
Trouble began in August 1931, and Iowa Gov. Dan Turner called out the Iowa National Guard to quell… incidents of armed resistance… against a new state law requiring veterinary inspections of dairy cattle.
After an unruly group of farmers attacked a veterinarian’s car, the Guard set up machine guns at intersections of farm-to-market roads in eastern Iowa to prevent mobs from forming.
The Agricultural Adjustment Act of April 1933 took much of the force from the Farm Holiday movement, which in Iowa had consisted of little more than a few blocked roads.
But Roosevelt and Wallace couldn’t stop a fresh wave of violence in the spring and summer of 1933 when the foreclosure moratorium was challenged by desperate lenders. Twice in that year, Iowa Gov. Clyde Herring declared martial law and called the Guard, complete with fixed bayonets, to keep order…
…a legal challenge to the state foreclosure moratorium was met by a committee of farmers who took over the courthouse. A judge was dragged from his bench, beaten and threatened with lynching.
A sheriff and deputies who were attempting to enforce a foreclosure were forced by an armed mob of farmers to kneel and kiss the American flag.
* LAW
* DECEMBER 3, 2010, 8:34 P.M. ET
Judge Blocks Banks’ Bid to Dismiss Mortgage Lawsuits
By NICK TIMIRAOS
A Pennsylvania judge refused to dismiss certain claims brought by the Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh against J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Countrywide Financial Corp., in one of the earliest lawsuits seeking damages over soured mortgage securities.
The Pittsburgh bank sued J.P. Morgan and Countrywide, which was acquired by Bank of America Corp., alleging that offering documents related to $2.7 billion in mortgage-backed securities it purchased included incomplete and inaccurate information about the risks of those securities.
The Pittsburgh bank had also sued ratings companies, arguing that they had improperly provided triple-A ratings to those mortgage bonds.
Banks and ratings companies moved to dismiss the lawsuits. The court sided with the defendants in dismissing some of the claims made by the Pittsburgh bank. It also largely dismissed those against the ratings companies.
But the opinion will allow certain “fraudulent misrepresentation” claims to move forward against units J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. and Countrywide Securities Corp.
…
The Mortgage Deduction Should Be Done Away With–But It Won’t
Dec 3 2010, 4:21 PM ET 54
Having recently entered into homeownership, I am now in the unhappy state of having to advocate against my own interest. As someone whose freelance expenses make it worthwhile to itemize, I plan to take the mortgage interest tax deduction until they phase the damn thing out, or I pay off the house, whichever comes first. But as an economics journalist, I retain my deep hatred for the thing.
…