The Foreclosure Crisis: Human Greed, Entitlement, and Deception

There is, I believe, no easy way to solve the foreclosure crisis. The reason for this is that the underlying problem is not merely the individual foreclosures. The underlying problem isn’t even all of the foreclosures as a whole which constitute the crisis. No, the real underlying problem is ultimately human greed. Consequently, the way to solve the foreclosure crisis, I believe, is not merely through some kind of “stimulus plan.” Yet, this matter shall be examined more thoroughly later.

First, the causes of the foreclosure crisis must be examined. I don’t think that the causes are all that complicated. In the end, the cause is twofold: First, people were buying houses they couldn’t afford, and banks were lending money to these people. Second, banks were engaging in unscrupulous lending practices. They were charging people money that these people neither were expecting to pay nor were able to pay. They were advertising one interest rate and actually putting another in the contract. I’m not sure what the law says about this last bit, but that sounds a lot like ‘fraud’ to me. If my reader disagrees, then I ask him to imagine the following:

Suppose you have a man who is in dire need of having his house painted, but, the house being very large, doesn’t want to do it himself. One of his friends is well aware of how greatly in need his friend’s house is of being painted, and therefore he offers to paint the man’s house for twenty dollars. The man thinks to himself: “Wow, what a nice guy! My house is this big, and he’s going to paint it for just twenty dollars!” Therefore, he agrees to pay his friend twenty dollars in exchange for painting the house. He talks to his friend a few days later, and he says: “Hey, pal! We’re still on? Twen...

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...d, lenders would be much more careful in the kinds of loans that they give out, and they would be more careful about what kind of conditions they set out for their debts. They would be much less inclined to engage in exploitive, unfair business exchanges out of fear of consumer retaliation.

This, therefore, is ultimately my solution: Since Americans are ruled more by their appetites more than by reason, and since I doubt that our politicians, because of their love of money, can be trusted to act solely in the interest of the citizens who put them in office, there must be legislation dictating that lenders lend at their own risk.

Works Cited

Metallica (James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammet). "And Justice for All,.." And

Justice for All… 1988. Elektra Records.

Plato. Plato: Complete Works. (Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company,

1997).