While I sit here in my office, my entire town has run out of gas.
Yep, it was a good old fashion gas run just like the 1970s.
It started yesterday when Charlotte gas stations started running out of gas.
No doubt those NCers near the border decided to head to SC to get gas. We’re the first town over the border.
And all day long my mommies forum has been atwitter over some stations being out of gas. And I’ve just read that one of the largest stations in our town has just run out.
I have 1/4 of a tank left.
Oh boy.
Here comes “Working From Home” J!
Thanks, Bush.
Denis, Bush has nothing to do with it ~ it was the hurricane. Sheesh. Okay, perhaps you are doing what we love to do, whenever something bad happens we say, “It’s Clinton’s fault.” His name has come up in conversations about the crisis on Wall Street ~ in a way it really IS his fault.
I think your site is adding to the panic… 🙂
Lori – not enough locals read my site to create a panic. =)
MB – I wish! Sadly, the legal field doesn’t enable much working from home for admins. For LAWYERS, yes, but not admins.
Denis – *rolls eyes*
Marmie, you HAVE to be kidding me. I knew you Bush-huggers would find a way to pin this on Clinton. Surprised you didn’t also blame Obama and Hillary while you were at it. You’re incredible. LOL
Let’s face it – politicans are not to blame for what’s happening on Wall Street. It’s the CEOs and other executives at these companies who are to blame for the fall of their banks. It’s the lender’s fault for giving money to people who couldn’t really afford that mortgage loan. It’s the fault of the people that went out and got a $500,000 home mortgage on a $150,000 home budget and then realized too late they couldn’t afford the $500,000 mortgage after all.
There’s something to be said for PERSONAL RESPONSIBLILTY and there is a percentage of this country’s population that refuses to take its – both as CEOs and homeowners. The CEOs had the responsibility to look out for the people they were supposedly helping with the American Dream and only loan them what they could truly afford. And the homeowners should have looked more closely at that loan to make sure they could agree to the terms of payment. And because the CEOs turned a blind eye, and because the homeowners turned a blind eye, everyone else now has to pay for it – which is just WRONG WRONG WRONG.
Sheesh. It had nothing to do with Clinton, Bush, Obama, McCain, Biden or Palin.
Denis, a few facts for you from history. Note the dates:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_subprime_mortgage_financial_crisis
says in part, “Amendments to the CRA [Community Reinvestment Act] in the mid-1990s, raised the amount of home loans to otherwise unqualified low-income borrowers and also allowed for the first time the securitization of CRA-regulated loans containing subprime mortgages.” and, “In 1995, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac began receiving affordable housing credit for purchasing mortgage bank securities which included loans to low income borrowers. This resulted in the agencies purchasing subprime securities.” Both of those events were on Clinton’s watch. So, from history, the seeds of the problem were sown on the Clinton Administration. Clinton encouraged both actions, in the name of increasing minority home-ownership.
What opened the doors was the repeal of the Glass-Stegall Act. From wikipedia:
“The bill that ultimately repealed the Act was introduced in the Senate by Phil Gramm (R-TX) and in the House of Representatives by James Leach (R-IA) in 1999. The bills were passed by a 54-44 vote along party lines with Republican support in the Senate[7] and by a 343-86 vote in the House of Representatives[8]. Nov 4, 1999: After passing both the Senate and House the bill was moved to a conference committee to work out the differences between the Senate and House versions. The final bipartisan bill resolving the differences was passed in the Senate 90-8-1 and in the House: 362-57-15. Without forcing a veto vote, this bipartisan, veto proof legislation was signed into law by President Bill Clinton on November 12, 1999.”
So, there is plenty of blame to go around. It’s not all Clinton, or Bush, or Democrat or all Republican. Both parties had opportunities to step up and both failed.
It’s curious how this crisis mirrors the S&L crisis of the ’80’s so closely. That crisis was triggered by removal of restrictions on S&L’s under Carter’s administration. We didn’t learn, or we forgot, and we removed the same restrictions on the banks in the ’90’s with the results that the banks acted just like the S&Ls did in the early 1980’s, with almost exactly the same result.
But a much bigger price tag. I love how in the announcement that just came out, one Congressman is saying that because the taxpayers did nothing wrong, it’s WALL STREET that will have to bear the brunt of the expense for the bailout.
Uh, yeah, like the Wall Street that has my 401K, pension plan and IRA money to play around with?
“much bigger price tag” is relative. In the ’80’s that $400B was HUGE, and was a major choke on the citizenry. However, it got whittled down to the $160B now, and will continue to decline as the assets reach parity. I found an inflation calculator at http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl that says a 1980 $1 is now $2.66. So $400B in 1980 would be $1T now. That makes the current crisis about the same as the 1980 S&L crisis in size. We survived that, we’ll survive this. I’d say as a guess that the real cost of the actions will be in the neighborhood of $300 B as a long term investment that will take a while to capitalize out. Eventually the gov’t breaks even, as it will with RTC.
But it’s not just the $700B. It’s the Bear Stearns bailout ($30B), the Fannie/Freddie bailout ($200B), the AIG bailout ($85B) AND this new one ($700B) that all took place within two weeks of each other.
700+30+200+85 = 1015. 1015/2.66=381. So, in real terms, the current situation is actually about the same as the 1980 crisis. (Just more hype because of the election process.)
Yes, but now you have to add WaMu. And apparently the House just passed a spending bill that included a $25B loan for the failing auto industry. So now it’s more like $401 in inflation dollars with no sign of going any LOWER.
Why add WaMu? It was sold the same day it was taken over. From the news “[FDIC chairwoman] Bair concluded a late night conference call by saying, “This is the big one that everyone was worried about. I was worried about it and I think it’s a very positive story today that was resolved successfully without taxpayer cost, without cost to the insurance fund, and all depositors insured and uninsured are protected.” ”
“without taxpayer cost” are the key words
As for what the House may have done, that’s nothing to do with the banks. The American auto industry has been lazy for decades, stymied by high labor union costs, old design and outmoded methods. They got blown away by the Japanese/Korean/European models in reliability and building techniques. I don’t think the Senate will go along.
So, amount stays under $400B inflation dollars.