Today's proposition: living beyond your means at the expense of others is unethical. That includes borrowing money that you have no intention or ability to pay back.
The author of the following article is Edmund Andrews, an economics reporter for The New York Times. That fact is just another reason why selling the U.S. economy short is probably the best retirement strategy anyone can make.
The most pathetic part of the article is the concluding paragraph;
I was actually beginning to feel sorry for Chase. It seemed to be so flooded with defaulting borrowers that it didn’t have time to foreclose on my house. Eight months after my last payment to the bank, I am still waiting for the ax to fall.
Andrews provides no explanation as to why he and his wife have not sold their over-leveraged home and started to live within their means. Instead, they continue to commit larceny on the U.S. taxpayers who have funded the bank bailout. JPMorgan Chase is in no hurry to foreclose of their house because their losses are now being covered by the U.S. taxpayer. What a scam.
"waiting for the ax to fall"? No, you're living rent free. lucky you.
ReplyDeleteGovernment bailouts themselves are unethical. The reason that they are unethical is because they are purely discretionary.
ReplyDeleteTake the auto industry, for example. If I am an investor in Chrysler or GM, my investment is at least partially protected by virtue of government bailout spending. Yet if I am an investor in Inco, and the mining Company declares bankruptcy, I lose my money, period. How is that fair?
It's only unethical to a capitalist. Just like sex outside of marriage is unethical to a christian. But there is no evidence that the universe follows any ideology. This sounds like you should be Capitalist Missionary preaching the laws of capital and shaming those who break them.
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It is absurd to talk about fairness in capitalism because it is not founded on fairness. It has never been fair. And an ethical government has yet to exist.
@Another Fool - I do not understand your comments. Government bailouts are the antithesis of capitalism and free markets, correct. The two cannot co-exist.
ReplyDeleteBut government bailouts of private companies are also completely contrary to Marxist economics, unless they are applied across the board, for example, so the investors of Inco get the same benefits as the investors of Chrysler. You name the economic theory, whether Adam Smith's invisible hand, the social utopia advocated by Karl Marx, Keynesian principles or more modern Galbraith policies; there is no foundation for government bailouts of select private corporations. None.
Capitalism needs government to enforce property rights. The government needs to stay in power so bailouts happen. Are private bailouts more fair? Those without capital are screwed either way.
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