Saturday, April 25, 2009

Who could have seen the present troubles coming?

When a big disruption to the status quo occurs, it's usually quite unexpected. Such events are sometimes called "black swan" events. The current economic meltdown is sometimes described in this way. However, it would be wrong to describe it as such, because some people were not surprised at all. And I don't just mean super-specialized academics, but bloggers like Atrios, who predicted serious trouble five years ago:
Here's the deal. Interest rates go up. Your housing price falls. Your mortgage payment goes up substantially. You can no longer afford to make your mortgage payment. And, since the market value of your house is now less than the value of your outstanding loan, you can't just sell and trade down. Default. Foreclosure. Cardboard box.
I actually remember seeing that post back in 2004; ironically enough I was working for a call centre at the time that was calling the US and pushing these dubious mortgages. And surely Atrios isn't the only one to have thought of this, and I was most definitely not the only one to read his post. So why did almost nobody listen?

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