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A discussion started about the recent bailout vote in the comments to this entry. The House didn't pass it, but the Senate did. This obviously increases pressure on the House, since the Senate passed it by a huge majority.
But here's the problem for me. I'm not terribly confident of my opinions on economic issues, but so far I'm leaning toward the fact that a bailout was necessary (partly because of this blog entry I was linked), but should have contained some kind of assistance for people whose homes were going into foreclosure because their mortgage lenders were nitwits. The idea (if I have this right) is that if we can keep those individuals from defaulting on their mortgages, the mortgage lenders won't go under, which solves the crisis from the bottom up instead of the top down.
My reservation here is that if "trickle down" economics doesn't work to get money to the bottom, I would need to know more before I confidently assert that the mortgage assistance would work to get money to the top. Though I suppose, on the other hand, those people are "on the top" because they're good at getting money to themselves and will do much of the work seeing that they get it.
So, at first blush, it looks like a great idea to put the money in at the bottom. It helps the middle-class folk who're getting nailed as a result of someone else's business practices, and avoids the nastiness of rewarding bad business practices. Is there some reason (aside from a political interest in helping legislators’ rich buddies) why this is not being done? Because I haven’t heard it, and I want to know what the arguments are before I leap headlong into advocating for one thing or another.
I'm kinda lost here. Help?
But here's the problem for me. I'm not terribly confident of my opinions on economic issues, but so far I'm leaning toward the fact that a bailout was necessary (partly because of this blog entry I was linked), but should have contained some kind of assistance for people whose homes were going into foreclosure because their mortgage lenders were nitwits. The idea (if I have this right) is that if we can keep those individuals from defaulting on their mortgages, the mortgage lenders won't go under, which solves the crisis from the bottom up instead of the top down.
My reservation here is that if "trickle down" economics doesn't work to get money to the bottom, I would need to know more before I confidently assert that the mortgage assistance would work to get money to the top. Though I suppose, on the other hand, those people are "on the top" because they're good at getting money to themselves and will do much of the work seeing that they get it.
So, at first blush, it looks like a great idea to put the money in at the bottom. It helps the middle-class folk who're getting nailed as a result of someone else's business practices, and avoids the nastiness of rewarding bad business practices. Is there some reason (aside from a political interest in helping legislators’ rich buddies) why this is not being done? Because I haven’t heard it, and I want to know what the arguments are before I leap headlong into advocating for one thing or another.
I'm kinda lost here. Help?
