The financial industry, whose greed and irresponsibility helped steer the economy into the trash bin, the same industry that then needed an unprecedented rescue package courtesy of the American taxpayer, is now suddenly the picture of prudence when it comes to modifying a hard-pressed homeowner's mortgage.
"Greed is good." By now, we're all familiar with Gordon Gecko's famous line from Wall Street. We're also familiar with the real-life consequences that flow from unchecked and unregulated greed. Between far too many in the financial services industry channeling Gecko and far too many Bush Administration appointees turning a blind eye to financial reckless and irresponsibility, we're slowly turning into a modern version of the Dust Bowl generation. I can still remember listening to stories told by contemporaries of my grandparent relating their experiences from the Depression. Never did I think that my own generation would be reliving those stories and experience the same sort of pain and devastation. I never thought my generation might be staring at the reality of sharing similar stories with our own grandchildren.
The sad thing is that it didn't have to be this way. Yes, I understand the concept of economic cycles. Things go up and they come back down...ebb and flow; it's the nature of capitalist economics. We strive for success, and if we're good (and sometimes lucky) we achieve it and try to put ourselves in a position where we can weather the down times. The American Dream is still what drives many of us, and it can take many forms. For some it's achieving something better than the life that their parents lived. For others it's trying to breathe life into an idea and create something that will be of value in the marketplace, thus bringing them a financial reward. Whatever form one's "American Dream" might take, my generation is now waking up to the reality that achieving that dream simply may not be meant to be. In most cases, this has nothing to do with a lack of skill, talent, or ideas. It has everything to do with greed, financial irresponsibility, and the willingness to sacrifice reason and common sense on the altar of the Almighty Dollar.
The flood of foreclosed homes on the market has helped push down real estate values to the point that nearly a third of American homeowners find themselves in a limbo known as "negative equity." In common parlance, they are underwater -- they owe more on the house than it is worth.
I'm no economist, so I'm not going sit here and launch into a dissertation on the causes of the current economic meltdown. I may not have the academic chops to hold forth on broad macroeconomic concepts and forces, but from where I sit it seems blindingly obvious how we got to where we are: greed (banks and mortgage companies drunk on high margins and unwilling to exercise even the barest minimum of caution and prudence) and lack of regulation and oversight (Bush administration regulators too ignorant, lazy or morally bereft to perform the duties of their office). Combine that with home buyers willing to commit to mortgages they neither understood nor fully considered (if it sounds too good to be true....), and here we are. My generation may well one day be telling the same sorts of stories that my grandmother's generation did...and this could have been prevented. Even worse is that this recession is creating what may well be a "lost generation"- young people ready, willing, and able, but faced with the reality that there are simply no jobs to be had.
I feel incredibly blessed to have a job, and one that, even better, is relatively secure. Sure, I have my frustrations with it, but I can pay my bills, put food on the table, and have a little bit of fun now and again. Not so very long ago, that was the sort of thing that was easy to take for granted. I don't have to look far to gain some perspective, though. I have a friend who's been out of work for all of 2009. She's talented, capable, and possessed of a keen mind and a dream that she dearly wants to pursue. Dreams don't often come easy, though, and she needs to be able to support herself and her son while she works on getting to where she wants to be. She's fortunate to have some resources to fall back on, but one can only live on savings for so long. How is it that she's been unable to find work of any sort for close to a year? How? Because here in Oregon, one person out of eight is unemployed. Because the people who shouldn't have been minding the cookie jar weren't. Because corporate greedhead scum were allowed to ransack the castle unchecked and and questioned. A lot of people really should be going to prison, but that's never going to happen...because we, through our inattention, inability to think critically, and greed, allowed this to happen.
I suppose this is what happens when you build your house on a foundation of sand.
