September 30, 2008

Ethnic data on subprime loans

One of the problems we've all had in discussing the racial angle of the mortgage meltdown is the lack of good data.

Since writing that fairly comprehensive article on Saturday, I've also found some seemingly trustworthy statistics on recent subprime loans by ethnicity. (Unfortunately, nobody seems to have calculated defaults by ethnicity. Perhaps nobody wants to know?)

We do know that defaults are closely tied to subprime loans. The most toxic of all, adjustable rate mortgage (ARM) subprime loans, accounted in early 2008 for only six percent of all loans outstanding but 39 percent of foreclosures started. Fixed and adjustable subprimes account for only 12 percent of loans outstanding, but half of current foreclosures. The subprime share of new lending roughly doubled from 2003 to 2004 and increased again in 2005. So far, that's where most of the "unexpected" defaults have come from, although the default contagion will likely spread to lower interest rate adjustable rate mortgages in the near future.

Compliance Tech, a firm that helps lenders "Manage Diverse Lending Markets," estimates that in 2004-2006, minorities accounted for 44 percent of all subprime loans, with Hispanics slightly outnumbering blacks.

The numbers we really want, though, are defaults, dollar value of defaults, and incremental dollar values of defaults over expected levels.

Minorities with subprime loans probably have higher default rates than whites with subprime loans. For example, default rates on college loans are about five times higher for blacks, and more than two times higher for Hispanics, than they are for whites. (Asians are best of all at paying back college loans.) Normally, college loans are handed out more willy-nilly than mortgages, so the ethnic default rate gaps likely aren't as big in mortgages, but willy-nilly pretty much describes 2004-2006 mortgage lending in some markets.

On the other hand, they likely tend to have lower value mortgages. On the other other hand, many Hispanics are found in expensive states, especially California, epicenter of the crisis. The largest defaults in America as measured in dollar losses (number of defaults times size) appear to have come out of California's exurban fringe: the Inland Empire, Antelope Valley, and the Central Valley. All these areas tend to have mixed white and Hispanic populations.

My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer

63 comments:

Anonymous said...

If your data match census boundaries, "ethnicity" can get surprisingly specific, as that was asked about on the last two US Censuses.

E.g., do Danish-Americans have a higher or lower default rate than Norwegian-Americans?

Truth said...

"Minorities with subprime loans probably have higher default rates than whites with subprime loans."

And of course they default on much less expensive houses. How many 35,000 houses in downtown Detroit does it take to equal Ed McMahon's mansion anyway?

I know you people like to feed your own egos, but you don't really believe that a few thousand blacks taking out mortgages they couldn't afford is causing the WORLD economy to collapse do you (a lot of bruvas taking loans from the Bank of Scotland? Northern Bank of England?) I mean, do you really?

I didn't think anyone was that stupid. I guess I gave you to much credit.

Anonymous said...

How about Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) reports?

Anonymous said...

This might be a place to start:

http://www.ffiec.gov/hmdaadwebreport/
nataggwelcome.aspx

Anonymous said...

(Asians are best of all at paying back college loans.)

This fact is the "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain" comment that the "CRA cheerleaders" always want us to conveniently ignore.

I am employed in financial regulation, and attended a class on CRA where this fact was acknowledged, I think in relation to the "Boston Federal Reserve Study" of a few years ago.

One of the instructors (black, of course!) actually made a flippant comment about how Asians are actually approved at higher rates than whites, he basically said something like: "but we're going to ignore that fact here, since we're mainly concerned with loan discrimination against blacks/hispanics".

Truth said...

News Flash! This Just In!

Wait a minute ladies and gentlemen, Truth is a man, a real man and when Truth is wrong, and it is indisputably proven, he admits it. The latest bank failure has chasened me, humbled me and cause me to eat a big slice of crow.

Here is a bank that had to bailed out by the government today that quite obviously failed due to it's large African-American clientele.

Blacks are obviously to blame for the global banking crisis. I apologize for all 40 million of us.

Anonymous said...

On KPFA just heard a speaker with an English accent characterize the "sub-prime crisis" as a "massive dispossession of poor people."

albertosaurus said...

In the absense of regulation no rational lender would lend to a black student very often. Therefore government regulation necessarily means more bad loans.

We should remember this when we hear politicians call for more government regulation as a cure for the bad loan crisis.

Most of the government is currently either Democrat or "compassionate conservative". For there to be real lasting reform these kind of leaders must recognize that their views on NAMs are wrong at least in part.

I believe that most of our leaders do not literally believe in ethnic equality. But since they dare not even hint at that in public, they are forced inevitably to support policies that just can't work - like equal outcomes for education and home ownership.

Politicians and other leaders who go along with policies that ignore race reality are willing to pay the price (in taxpayers money). Currently the price tag is $700 billion. That seems to me like a lot of money but apparently its not enough.

Very few public figures seem willing even now to clearly admit that NAM home ownership rates should be expected to be lower than those of Whites and Asians. It would be labeled as racism, which of course it is. As of today $700 billion is still too little to induce many to confront race realities.

Therefore we must expect another round of bad and ever more expensive policies. Apparently the price tag for race difference blindness is in the trillions.

Anonymous said...

It is useless to discuss things with people like Truth or tootalljones. People like these will never admit basic facts about black and Hispanic crime rates, educational levels, tendencies to promiscuity, and the like -- let alone their likely partial basis in genetics. So of course any inferences from those basic facts are also going to be denied.

But anyway, here is how the financial system works.

1) American banks are forced by CRA, HMDA, etc. to reduce loaning standards to boost minority home ownership.

2) They pass the hot potato on to financial engineers who package it in various kinds of derivatives.

3) Credit rating agencies are intimidated by the govt into giving even the toxic waste slices AAA ratings (see here for a great example of what happens when a rating agency gets on the govt.'s bad side).

4) These "AAA" rated derivatives are sold to foreigners and sovereign wealth funds who have no idea that the underlying assets are held by underclass blacks, illegal aliens, and speculating slumlords.

And thus does the civilizational disease of America's underclass start causing problems all the way over in Europe and Asia. There is precedent; these are after all the same Europeans who are taught to worship gangsta rap and NBA basketball players while spurning the traditions of their forefathers.

It's the basic rule of statistics: garbage in, garbage out. You cannot build wealth on top of a low IQ populace, you can only fake it till it all comes crashing down. And this is just the beginning. Wait till all the boomers find out that Latinos and AfAms aren't too enthusiastic about paying for their social security...

Anonymous said...

The subprime crisis moves poor people out of newly desirable living areas. Where I live their is a historic black neighborhood very convenient to an expanding university. The undergraduate class size of the university went from 2100 in 1990 to 3300 in 2008. So that's an extra 4800 students who need housing. Some of that demand is filled by encroaching on the black neighborhood. Well, how do black people lose their houses? bad mortgage loans. This is another anecdote in Sailer's hypotheses about population transfers. The city is losing black residents, while the surrounding area is gaining black residents.

Truth said...

In my haste to apoligize I forgot to properly hyperlink the article

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business
/2008/sep/29/icelandiceconomy.banking

Anonymous said...

Congrats truth.

I see a lot of positive growth in your last post. Remember, the first step to recovery is acknowledging you have a problem.

Keep it up.

Anonymous said...

The Federal Reserve data are close to Steves, and reliable (they measure high price loans, including the spread).

I already posted the link, but because of the obfuscation of the people who seem to be in denial I will write out the info.

In 2005-2006 they report totally 8.2 million reported new loan-financed home, about 70% bought by Whites/Asians.

Of these 2.05 million homes where financed by high-price high-risk mortgages. Of the high-price mortgage subcategory 905.000 where purchased by non-Hispanic whites. The majority, 56% where purchased by non-whites.

Asians bought 3.5% of the high-risk loans, less than their population ratio and far less than their share of total homes purchased. (A reasonably high group are “others”, including mix race and “unknown”. Race Unknown has the racial characteristics of non-whites.) Getting Asians included will not save your from reality.

Note also that many immigrants, such as middle easterners, are included as white. (while middle-easterners typically love to invest in property, the most stable object in their home countries, they tend to borrow more from family than banks, so I wouldn’t guess they were a major driver in this, but who knows).

One excuse is that minorities get fewer loans per application. True. But they also APPLIED for proportionally more high-cost loans, and in total GOT more loans.

The other excuse is that minorities are so poor their purchases could not possibly effect the total market. Wrong. The median 2006 value of high price home-purchase loan was 165.000$, not much different than the total median of 185k (remember more than half these loans are purchased by non-whites). The mean for the high-risk purchases was 209k, only 10% lower than the total mean. In the 2000 census the median home value of Hispanics and Blacks was 85% and 65% of non-Hispanic whites. This means that while the home loans for non-whites are smaller, they are not THAT much smaller.

The only data missing is default rate by race. Even assuming it’s the same for whites and others (which it almost certainly is not) about half of defaults where by non-whites.

So are minorities half the blame? No. First of all this has to do with marginal defaults (compared to historical practice), where the expected losses were higher than average.

And even if we can’t calculate
this, there is simple point in terms of who contributed to the high-risk of the market. Whites+Asians took almost 5 low-risk loan for every high-risk loan, whereas for the other groups the ratio was 1.4 to one.

Anonymous said...

Aww, c'mon "truth". Give us some stats, willya? Blow some holes in Stevarino's numbers.

Don't just hang out like some sulky bruthaman and complain. This is a reality-based community here.

You sound like those white guys who get their feelings hurt over at TBWT.com or TheRoot.com.

And remember, the plural of "anecdote" is not "statistics".

Who knows, if you make the effort to actually come up with something other than a plea for a Pity Party folks here might listen.

But you got to do your homework, bruthaman.

Anonymous said...

People don’t understand how poor people can ruin the world economy. Some points:

1. A (very oversimplified) way to think of this is that there were 5% unexpected losses in the 12 trillion mortgage industry (roughly 700 billion, which is no coincidence).
This is very little compared to GDP. But banks and financial institutions are extremely overleveraged, and didn’t expect losses in traditionally safe instruments. They also have to have a certain amount of equity to loans.
Keeping a leverage of say 15 means these guys have to sell assets for over 10 trillion to get back where they were. Things are made worse because they are all selling at once, and selling the same type of assets at once.
So you get huge multipliers in financial sectors, something you wouldn’t get in other sectors. This is why even people like Milton Friedman said that the state, under some situations, should intervene in financial markets. (of course that does not mean they should do any stupid thing, just pointing out banks are different).
2. “Poor” Americans are pretty rich. The median income of Hispanic households is 38.000 dollars, and 31.000 for Blacks. Since there are 100 million non-whites in the US you are talking about large figures, even internationally. Certainly many of these mortgages were in the 100-200.000$ range. One can argue that they shouldn’t have given loans to minorities, but no one can argue that the banks didn’t.

3. It surprises me that Steve didn’t mention this, but income is not likely to be the only source behind this over representation in bad mortgages, student loans and defaults. Norms and IQ must be important parts, even given income.

In King of the Hill episode "Lady and Gentrification"
Hank has to teach his Mexican co-worker Enrique how to save for the down-payment for a house, since Enrique, as he proudly point out, uses all his wage for festivals and funerals.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/12039/king-of-the-hill-lady-and-gentrification

Anonymous said...

Truth (sic),

Also in your haste you should actually read Steve's article in which he makes it clear that no one group of buyers is responsible for this mess. It was the change across the industry driven by Govt social engineering.

Anonymous said...

No ethnic data here, but a very interesting read:

NO MONEY DOWN: Rushkoff on the rigged credit system

Anonymous said...

Congratulations, Troof! What you've proved is that sometimes different banks (or economies) fail for different reasons. Iceland's Glitnir (assets: $3 billion) got way in over it's head on business loans to Great Britain and so therefore that proves that dumbing down the lending standards had nothing to do with the crisis in the US. Yep, all these banks failing are failing because they lent money to British businesses!

Anonymous said...

One of the problems we've all had in discussing the racial angle of the mortgage meltdown is the lack of good data... (Unfortunately, nobody seems to have calculated defaults by ethnicity. Perhaps nobody wants to know?) We do know that defaults are closely tied to subprime loans. The most toxic of all, adjustable rate mortgage (ARM) subprime loans, accounted in early 2008 for only six percent of all loans outstanding but 39 percent of foreclosures started. Fixed and adjustable subprimes account for only 12 percent of loans outstanding, but half of current foreclosures. The subprime share of new lending roughly doubled from 2003 to 2004 and increased again in 2005. So far, that's where most of the "unexpected" defaults have come from, although the default contagion will likely spread to lower interest rate adjustable rate mortgages in the near future.

Fair enough, but your own data shows that contrary to claims of minority loans playing a "big role" in the meltdown, or a stampede of fearful white people driving themselves into bankruptcy due to fear of some Mexicans moving in next door, subprimes make up a relatively small percentage of all outstanding loans, shown by your data at 6% and 12% respectively. Even with higher default rates within these limited paramaters, these relatively small percentages undermine the "minority loan defaults caused our crisis" drumbeat. Are such loans part of the overall financial mess? Of course. But the key question remains, how significant are they to the overall picture? Sure minority defaults are higher, but they weren't getting that big a slice of the total pot to begin with according to your own data. Your limited percentages suggest that those looking to point the finger at minority defaults or "affirmative action loans" are way off base.


Furthermore, growth in sub-prime financing is nothing new in the US housing economy. They have been a growing part of the mix since the 1980s. As one source puts it:

The roots of subprime lending growth in the 1990s can be found in two pieces of legislation enacted in the 1980s. The 1980 Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act (DIDMCA) effectively eliminated states' interest rate ceilings on home mortgages where the lender has a first lien... ------- Subprime home equity lending, as well as home equity lending in general, did grow following the passage of the Tax Reform Act of 1986... Therefore, the Tax Reform Act gave consumers an incentive to shift their consumer borrowing that was not secured by their home into home equity borrowing. During the 1990s, the economic expansion was accompanied by a rapid increase in consumer debt, and the concomitant boosts to house values continued to encourage home equity borrowing in particular. ------ An increase in access to the capital markets through loan securitization also contributed to growth in subprime lending in the 1990s. Securitization is the repackaging, pooling, and reselling of loans to investors as securities. .. ----- Through securitization, the subprime mortgage market strengthened its links with the broader capital markets, thereby increasing the flow of funds into the market and encouraging competition. (The degree of competition is especially a matter of concern in a market, such as the subprime mortgage market, in which reports of abusive lending practices have been frequent.)

source:
http://www.frbsf.org/publications/economics/letter/2001/el2001-38.html

Thus some seeds of the sub-prime crisis were sown well in advance of the current crisis, and the period of their sowing includes the Reagan, and Bush I era.


In addition, the much maligned Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) as a significant instrument in the current meltdown is dubious. So says the level-headed Business Week magazine, no less.
http://www.businessweek.com/investing/insights/blog/archives/2008/09/community_reinv.html

In its article: "Community Reinvestment Act had nothing to do with subprime crisis" it notes that the CRA "was actually weakened by the Bush administration just as the worst lending wave began." Most sub-prime loans have ben made by firms NOT subject to CRA jurisdiction. Approximately 80% of such loans did NOT fall under the bogus "affirmative action" rubric which some conservatives talk up as "causing" the current mortgage crisis.

If anything the CRA loans were better supervised that the others, and as the article says: "were less likely to end up securitized into the mortgage-backed securities that have caused so many losses, according to a recent study by the law firm Traiger & Hinckley (PDF file here).
.http://www.traigerlaw.com/publications/traiger_hinckley_llp_cra_foreclosure_study_1-7-08.pdf


Even more intriguing, the Bush II administration steadily WEAKENED CRA enforcement over its tenure, and ironically, "The CRA was at its strongest in the 1990s, under the Clinton administration, a period when subprime loans performed quite well.."

Far from "banks being forced to give affirmative action loans" to "unqualified minorities" and other dubious claims as to the cause of the crisis, the CRA was actually one of the least likely offenders. It was the Federal Reserve that did little to rein in the wild west practices of the OTHER 80% of the above lending picture.

There you have it. Your own data, and that provided by sober, conservative financial analysts debunking the so-called "affirmative action" loans alleged shoveled out or forced under the CRA. Again, the so-called "racial angle" of some posters has little credible evidence to support it.

Anonymous said...

When I first saw that ComplianceTech thing over at Bainbridge, I googled, and got almost nothing on them:

GOOGLE: compliancetech

[1500 hits for a company that claims to have been around since 1992?!?]

And then I sniffed around their website and got a bad feeling that they have an ax to ground:

"Compliance Management", "Fair Lending Services", "Statistical Modeling", "Shamus® Compliance Tool", "Diversity Conference" etc etc etc. ["Shamus" = Shame Us?!?]

I think I'd trust their numbers about as much as I'd trust any of this global warming nonsense coming out of the ecopagans.

PS: If you think these people wouldn't just invent the numbers out of thin air, then take a gander at Stan Liebowitz's piece from last February, recounting his experience with the liars at the Boston Fed:

THE REAL SCANDAL - HOW FEDS INVITED THE MORTGAGE MESS
By STAN LIEBOWITZ
February 5, 2008
nypost.com

PPS: Isn't it odd that 1992 is the year that the Boston Fed released their "landmark" study, and also, just coincidentally, the year that ComplianceTech was founded?

Hmmm...

PPPS: Odd too that there isn't the name of any single flesh & blood human being at the ComplainceTech website - not the name of any founder of ComplianceTech, not the name of the CEO, not the name of the Chariman of the Board - just not a damned thing of any personal nature whatsoever.

Very, very strange...

PPPPS: Here's the domain info on "ComplianceTech":

http://whois.domaintools.com/compliancetech.com

Looks to be a one-man operation, run out of Washington, DC, by some fellow named "Michael Taliefero".

Here's a google for him:

GOOGLE: michael taliefero

PPPPPS: The original 1992 Boston Fed report appeart to be here:

http://www.bos.frb.org/economic/wp/wp1992/wp92_7.pdf

Although apparently they had to keep revising it because of objections [I think I saw both 1993 & 1996 revisions in my googling].

Anonymous said...

Paul sez:

This fact is the "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain" comment that the "CRA cheerleaders" always want us to conveniently ignore.

I am employed in financial regulation, and attended a class on CRA where this fact was acknowledged, I think in relation to the "Boston Federal Reserve Study" of a few years ago.

One of the instructors (black, of course!) actually made a flippant comment about how Asians are actually approved at higher rates than whites, he basically said something like: "but we're going to ignore that fact here, since we're mainly concerned with loan discrimination against blacks/hispanics".


Fair enough. That assorted shakedown artists and "community activists" in various parts have exploited CRA regs to top off their coffers is well known, as are sweeping claims of race discrimination that ignore such basic factors as credit history.

But contrary to the claims of some conservatives about the meltdown being caused by "affirmative action" loans by the CRA, the CRA has had little to do with sparking the current crisis. In fact, among the players, CRA ops was more tightly policed, and made up only about 20% of the "crisis" loans. See Biz Week article here:

http://www.businessweek.com/investing/insights/blog/archives/2008/09/community_reinv.html

As for your link to
http://www.ffiec.gov/hmdaadwebreport/
nataggwelcome.aspx

assorted posters have some heavy lifting to do to prove that minority defaults caused the current meltdown. Sailer's own data shows that subprimes were a relatively small proportion of the loan pot, and even within that higher minority default percentages don't tell the whole story. If blacks and Mexicans post 50% of the defaults but are only borrowing 20% of the total cash, "blame the minorities" claims become even shakier.

Anonymous said...

The subprime crisis moves poor people out of newly desirable living areas. Where I live their is a historic black neighborhood very convenient to an expanding university. The undergraduate class size of the university went from 2100 in 1990 to 3300 in 2008. So that's an extra 4800 students who need housing. Some of that demand is filled by encroaching on the black neighborhood. Well, how do black people lose their houses? bad mortgage loans. This is another anecdote in Sailer's hypotheses about population transfers. The city is losing black residents, while the surrounding area is gaining black residents.



It would be ironic if all the hype various community activists make about "diversity" is actually leading more blacks to lose their homes. Such contradictions are par for the course in the politically correct welfare state.

Your point finds some support by Thomas Sowell who notes that "progressive" policies like "rent control", "green space", "urban renewal" and other things invoked in the name of the poor often end up benefitting the better off, while reducing the options and damaging the poor folks they were supposed to help in the first place.

"Green space" regulations in liberal San Francisco for example have had the (perhaps intended?) effect of raising costs and reducing new housing construction- driving poorer minorities out of housing within the city. Better-off whites then move in to snap up those vacated properties. The "gentrification" phenom in some areas in an example Sowell cites, as is "progressive" policies of rent control which actually REDUCE the supply of housing avialable to pooer minorities.

Anonymous said...

I would like to know why the bubble only busts in the last few weeks. Was there a structural breaking point which no-one foresaw and by chance this thing coincided with the elections? Or was it a case of the Wall Street bankers having known about this mess for at least 6 months, but decided to use it as a Weapon of Mass Destruction in order to get their boy, Obama, in; especially after McCain managed to turn the tide with Palin following the GOP convention. Surely they must have had a couple of nukes lined up in order to ensure the outcome of the election, and the meltdown was one of the larger nukes? Its clear Obama would not have stood a chance without the massive MSM campaign and the choreographed meltdown, all financed with the FED printing presses and ultimately backed up by the taxpayer.

Anonymous said...

What exactly is the history of subprime loans? How long have they been in existence and for what purpose? If they were created specifically to assist blacks and hispanics with bad credit, don't the very words "subprime loan crisis" mean "crisis of mortgage policy towards blacks and hispanics"?

Unknown said...

Hmm....let me see....

(44 plus 6 equals 50 and 50 is half of 100%, but let's see...100% minus 44% equals 56% couple 300m population divided by roughly 12% African American and 13% Hispanic American--of the population, hmm... not so sure is the other 56%but maybe they are foreigners....hold up!)

Can someone explain to me how a few african american housewives and maybe a few african american body shop owners with a couple ged's and maybe a high school diploma or two between'm have brought the mighty corporate america with it's MBA's and PHD's in economic's from Harvard and Princton and Yale ect to it's knees from holding a 150k homeloan!?

Could be my #'s or Mr. Sailors (more likely Geo. Bush's,) but how does one add this up?

(insert sarcasm wherever you like...)


Damm!

Anonymous said...

A question for Truth:

Would you object to legislation that would essentially ban 'no-doc' loans, and disallow the use of 'non-traditional sources of income' like welfare payments and unemployment benefits, or unverifiable income or 'no-job' loans, which rely solely on the borrower's 'stated assets'?

In other words, would you be satisfied if mortgage lending institutions returned to the "28% rule" and held all borrowers, regardless of ethnicity, to the exact same standards of creditworthiness?

Even if it meant a decline in black/Hispanic homeownership?

Anonymous said...

Steve,
It would be interesting to look at the student loan default rate by major.

Anonymous said...

I can't speak for the mortgage crisis, but the fire currently raging on wall street is another matter. This blog post states that the fire on Wall street is actually caused by an obscure government regulation.

Anonymous said...

Truth,
it was not a 'few thousand blacks' who got cheap home loans but millions of blacks and Hispanics.
(See many references on this site)

Banks were bullied into lending money to bad risk clients to such an extent that the entire credit system was undermined.

As for the knock on effects. You are right, blacks are not responsible for the collapse of UK banks but bankers from all around the world bought 'securitized' bundles of sub-prime loans because they thought, rightly, that the US Government would bail them out if it all went pear shaped.

Anonymous said...

"I know you people like to feed your own egos, but you don't really believe that a few thousand blacks taking out mortgages they couldn't afford is causing the WORLD economy to collapse do you (a lot of bruvas taking loans from the Bank of Scotland? Northern Bank of England?) I mean, do you really?"

Would you, please, give that straw man a rest?

Anonymous said...

Another interesting read:

Predatory Lenders' Partner in Crime
How the Bush Administration Stopped the States From Stepping In to Help Consumers
By Eliot Spitzer
Thursday, February 14, 2008

(Less than one month later, the Spitzer prostitution scandal reported by the NYT.)

Anonymous said...

Steve should address the cargo cult mentality running through our society.

That is, going to college makes one smarter or giving houses to poor people wil make them prosperous. Our government believes that giving the trappings of success to people will result in their success. But correllation does not equal causation.

Anonymous said...

"truth" - as I understand it, there are two going claims here.

(1) relaxed lending standards, here in the u.s., for *everyone* - whites, blacks, hispanics, whatever - contributed significantly to the present "crisis."

(2) the u.s.g.'s promotion of increased home-ownership - and especially minority home-ownership - contributed significantly to the relaxation of lending standards - again, here in the u.s.

do you have any data that contradicts either of these claims?

please try to answer calmly.

Anonymous said...

If only there was an American politician with the foresight of Lee Kuan Yew...

http://fareedzakaria.com/ARTICLES/other/culture.html

Lee Kuan Yew: Getting the fundamentals right would help, but these societies will not succeed in the same way as East Asia did because certain driving forces will be absent. If you have a culture that doesn't place much value in learning and scholarship and hard work and thrift and deferment of present enjoyment for future gain, the going will be much slower.

But, you know, the World Bank report's conclusions are part of the culture of America and, by extension, of international institutions. It had to present its findings in a bland and universalizable way, which I find unsatisfying because it doesn't grapple with the real problems. It makes the hopeful assumption that all men are equal, that people all over the world are the same. They are not.

Groups of people develop different characteristics when they have evolved for thousands of years separately. Genetics and history interact. The Native American Indian is genetically of the same stock as the Mongoloids of East Asia -- the Chinese, the Koreans and the Japanese. But one group got cut off after the Bering Straits melted away. Without that land bridge they were totally isolated in America for thousands of years. The other, in East Asia, met successive invading forces from Central Asia and interacted with waves of people moving back and forth. The two groups may share certain characteristics, for instance if you measure the shape of their skulls and so on, but if you start testing them you find that they are different, most particularly in their neurological development, and their cultural values.

Now if you gloss over these kinds of issues because it is politically incorrect to study them, then you have laid a land mine for yourself. This is what leads to the disappointments with social policies, embarked upon in America with great enthusiasm and expectations, but which yield such meager results. There isn't a willingness to see things in their stark reality. But then I am not being politically correct.

Anonymous said...

This is Micheal S. Taliefero's wife, at Howard University's School of Business:

Debra Lindsey-Taliefero, Ph.D.
bschool.howard.edu

Dr. Debra Lindsey-Taliefero joined the Department of Finance, International Business and Insurance in 1987, after serving as Economist for Defense Consultant, Anser, Inc. at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the National Urban League and the Washington Bureau of the NAACP. Her primary research areas of interest include: Consumer Credit, Racial Discrimination in Mortgage and Auto Finance Lending, and Black Consumer Demand Analysis for Luxury Automobiles. She has taught: Microeconomics for Business, and Managerial Economics. Lindsey has served as: Project Manager and Chief Economist for the Freddie Mac’s CreditSmart Curriculum at Howard University. Lindsey has published in the Journal of Studies in Economics and Financing, Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, Journal of Research in Minority Affairs, International Advances in Economic Research, Mortgage Banking Magazine, and the CRA Bulletin, She currently serves as: a member of the Editorial Board for the Journal Research on Minority Affairs, a member of the Advisory Council for the American Society for Competitiveness, Advisor of the Golden Key Honor Society, and a member for the Executive Board for the National Economic Association. She has received a number of wards including Professor of the Year for the MBA Program School of Business in 2004 and 2005 at Howard University, Washington, DC. Lindsey-Taliefero holds a Ph.D., an MA, and a BA from Howard University, Washington, DC.

For the record, I wouldn't trust either of these Talieferos if they said the grass was green and the sky was blue.

Anonymous said...

Oh, forgot to add this:

2003 DISTINGUISHED ALUMNUS
Dr. Debby Lindsey-Taliefero
coas.howard.edu

Dr. Lindsey Taliefero earned a B.A. in 1976, and M.A. in 1978 and a Ph. D. in 1983. She is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Finance at Howard University’s School of Business, where she has taught Economics for many years. She is dedicated to preparing students for the rigors of the business, finance, and economic world and in 2002 her students demonstrated their appreciation by selecting her as the “Professor of the Year’ in the School of business. Dr. Lindsey’s research efforts have focused on consumer issues, mortgage lending discrimination, and automobile credit discrimination. She has published in numerous economic journals and has provided expert testimony in Federal lawsuits alleging automobile credit discrimination. Prior to joining the HU faculty in 1987, Dr. Lindsey worked as an economist at the National Urban League, the NAACP, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and as a weapon systems research consultant for Analytic Services, Inc. She is married to attorney and businessman, Michael S. Taliefero and they have on son, Van Taliefero.

Anonymous said...

According to the clock on my computer, the "Thursday, September 28" cited in the article would be Thursday, September 28, 2006:

Conference Sheds New Light on Home-Loan Trends
diversityinc.com

Genworth Financial released findings from a new study that shows people of color are outpacing whites when it comes to purchasing new homes.

The findings were released on Thursday, Sept. 28, during the 2nd Annual Mortgage Lending Industry Diversity Markets Conference & Career Fair in Washington, D.C., sponsored by Genworth.

"The 2005 Minority Home Buying Surge" report, conducted by Genworth, shows that the percentage increase for all loans given to people of color in "high volume areas" was three times greater in the top 20 mortgage-growth metropolitan areas than it was for white households—and the increase for Latino, black and Asian-American loans was up to five times greater.

"We are now witnessing the positive effects of the growth in immigrant households who want to own a piece of the American Dream," said Michael Taliefero, managing director of ComplianceTech. "While immigration is part of the story, the lower homeownership rates among African Americans and Hispanics represent pent up mortgage demand that is starting to be filled."

The report used data from the 2005 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act to analyze the change in home loans purchased by people of color between 2004 and 2005 within 388 metropolitan areas around the United States. The data shows that borrowers of color had a greater percent change than whites in 320 of those markets. The rate for Latinos was 4.7 times greater than that for white borrowers among the top 20 high-volume metro areas, with at least 400 loans going to Latinos. The rate for blacks increased by 4.8 times the rate for white homebuyers, with at least 500 loans for blacks. The percent change for Asian Americans on home-purchase loans was 5 times greater than the 2005 rate for whites, with more than 200 loans in 2005 in the same areas.

"Despite the nationwide cooling in home buying, minorities represented a significantly larger percentage of new purchases in 2005 than they did in 2004," said Kevin Schneider, president of Genworth Financial's U.S. mortgage insurance business. "We're determined to help close the homeownership gap, and it's good to see that progress is being made."

The high-volume metro area with the greatest change in all lending for people of color was Ocala, Fla., with a 90 percent increase over 2004 levels for people of color, 7.5 times greater than the 12 percent increase in home-purchase loans for whites in that metro area. The top five markets for all home buying for people of color are Ocala, Fla.; Lakeland, Fla.; Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla.; Boise City-Nampa, Ind.; and Killeen-Temple-Fort Hood, Texas.

The three-day conference also featured guest speakers discussing ways to develop emerging market proficiencies, creating a focus on diversity and breaking beyond barriers to increasing homeownership in underserved markets. The speakers included Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole, president of Bennett College, who was a keynote speaker; Regina Lowrie, chairman of the Mortgage Bankers Association; Luke Visconti, partner and cofounder of DiversityInc; Daniel Mudd, president and chief executive officer for Fannie Mae; and Robert M. Couch, president of Ginnie Mae.

Anonymous said...

October 01, 2008
The Long Road to Slack Lending Standards
By Steven Malanga

"...Many defenders of the government’s efforts to prompt banks to lend more to minorities have claimed that this effort had little to do with the present mortgage mess. Specifically they point out that many institutions that made subprime mortgages during the market bubble weren’t even banks subject to the Community Reinvestment Act, the main vehicle that the feds used to cajole banks to loosen their lending.

"But this defense misses the point. In order to push banks to lend more to minority borrowers, advocates like the Boston Fed put forward an entire new set of lending standards and explained to the industry just why loans based on these slacker standards were somehow safer than the industry previously thought. These justifications became the basis for a whole new set of values (or lack of values), as no-down payment loans and loans to people with poor credit history or to those who were already loaded up with debt became more common throughout the entire industry.

"What happened in the mortgage industry is an example of how, in trying to eliminate discrimination from our society, we turned logic on its head. Instead of nobly trying to ensure equality of opportunity for everyone, many civil rights advocates tried to use the government to ensure equality of outcomes for everyone in the housing market. And so when faced with the idea that minorities weren’t getting approved for enough mortgages because they didn’t measure up as often to lending standards, the advocates told us that the standards must be discriminatory and needed to be junked...."

Truth said...

"Would you object to legislation that would essentially ban 'no-doc' loans, and disallow the use of 'non-traditional sources of income' like welfare payments and unemployment benefits, or unverifiable income or 'no-job' loans, which rely solely on the borrower's 'stated assets'?"

I'm not interested in 'banning' anything, we have too many laws as it is. For All I care, the banks can give out South Beach mansions for a hand-written I.O.U and a box of matchsticks as collateral.

I just want the bankers who make stupid loans to be responsible for their own actions. If that means that poor blacks and Hispanics don't get houses, tough. They should have saved their damn money.

Understand one thing though, and if I am wrong please correct me; No banker in America was ever forced at gunpoint to make a risky subprime loan. They made the loans to get an infusion of short-term cash into their own pockets. They did not complain about this mess when they were making fat commissions. You people have brought into the whole 'white Al Sharpton' victim mentality thing. Oh pitty the poor, innocent bankers, their arms were twisted behind their backs to make loans to the evil blacks who had blonds tied to the railroad tracks (insert moustache twirl here.)

Anonymous said...

It wouldn't surprise me in the least if the Talieferos were on the receiving end of these kinds of bribes - it's all just a big game to these people:

The Last Trillion-Dollar Commitment
The Destruction of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
By Peter J. Wallison, Charles W. Calomiris
Posted: Tuesday, September 30, 2008
aei.org

...In the same vein, Fannie and Freddie hired dozens of Washington's movers and shakers--at spectacular levels of compensation--to sit on their boards, lobby Congress, and in general help them to manage their political risk. (An early account of this effort was an article entitled "Crony Capitalism: American Style" that appeared in The International Economy in 1999.[4] A later version of the same point was made in Investor's Business Daily nine years later.[5]) The GSEs also paid for academic research to assure the public that the GSE mission was worthwhile and that the GSEs posed minimal risks to taxpayers. For example, Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz coauthored an article in 2002 purporting to show that the risk of GSE default producing taxpayer loss was "effectively zero"[6]...

Anonymous said...

There is one community left out in this discussion, no surprise.

Just as marriage has been offered to the black and Hispanic communities but not to the gay community, due to bigotry, hatred and homophobia, it follows that if subprime loans are also lent to the black and Hispanic communities but not to the gay community, it is also due to bigotry, hatred and homophobia.

So we haven't really progressed from the dark days of Ronald Reagan, who frittered away his time on trivialities like inflation and the Soviet Union rather than directing all the resources of government, FDR-style, to find an immediate cure for AIDS.

Anonymous said...

"Reg Thaethar", hilarious. I don't know if anyone else noticed that one...

Truth said...

"1) relaxed lending standards, here in the u.s., for *everyone* - whites, blacks, hispanics, whatever - contributed significantly to the present "crisis."

(2) the u.s.g.'s promotion of increased home-ownership - and especially minority home-ownership - contributed significantly to the relaxation of lending standards - again, here in the u.s.

do you have any data that contradicts either of these claims?

You added the magic phrase here, I'm proud of you.

"Contributed significantly", That is different than 'caused' now isn't it?

I can phathom what 'caused' means, but in your own humble opinion, what does 'contributed significantly' mean in a quantifiable sense. Does it mean 5% causation? 10%? 25%? 75%? I'm asking you here.

I believe that garbage served at fast-food restaurants 'contributes significantly' to the expanding waistlines of Americans. I have yet to see, however, anyone being force-fed a McDonalds hamburger. I for one, am 41 years old with 11% body fat.

I also believe that many women's ongoing sarcastic, mocking mouths 'contribute significantly' to spousal abuse, I do not however support pardoning husbands for killing their wives for this reason.

Do handguns 'contribute significantly' to murder rates? If not why are their less murders in London which has a much higher crime rate than in New York (and fewer blacks BTW)?

I don't know Steve, was that calm enough?

"Would you, please, give that straw man a rest?"

What freakin straw man???

The bank failures were caused by bankers making bad business decisions, period. I give for you, an example of banks in Scottland and England (3% black) and ICELAND (one black guy who drives a cab) that have failed in the past 2 weeks.

Now it's time for you all to grow up and give up the real straw man. The commercial real estate crash is coming next and it's going to make this little thing look like a farmer defaulted on a loan for a mule.

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/
comments/2007/12/coming-soon-com.
html


Now exactly how many poor ghetto families with no jobs and 12 kids do you think bought got loans to erect 12 story office buildings in Dallas? This may even challenge the spin techniques of even the most automated blacks=bad, whites=good poster on this board, although I have faith in all of your abilities!

Unknown said...

(In the words and spirit of that eloquent novelist Adam Smith....)

'Statistics are like a drunk leaning against a light pole, they are more for support than illumination.'

I am almost tempted to say that there is still something rotten in Denmark, but whatever it is, it probably would smell a whole lot more like periwinkle than the smell that can be found in D.C.

(sides, I wouldn't want too sullied the reputation of an otherwise honorable city as Denmark.)

Anonymous said...

I believe that most of our leaders do not literally believe in ethnic equality. But since they dare not even hint at that in public, they are forced inevitably to support policies that just can't work - like equal outcomes for education and home ownership.

I agree with this, except for the oxymoronic premise (that our "leaders" are actually our leaders); if they're not calling the shots, then they are by definition not our leaders.

Obviously, those creating the rules are the rulers ("leader" strikes me as far too benign a term).

Anonymous said...

I just want the bankers who make stupid loans to be responsible for their own actions. If that means that poor blacks and Hispanics don't get houses, tough. They should have saved their damn money.

It takes two to make a loan, speaking of responsibility for one's actions.

I too wanted to see Fannie and Freddie fail, and I too want the banks to fail in proportion to their misjudgment.

By the way, you're at one in that opinion with just about everyone here, but diametrically opposed to our likely next President, since one of the main things he was involved in during his early career was applying pressure to those bankers to get them to make those loans.

Still, the influence of those groups was certainly minicule compared with that of the Federal Government.

The bankers, as Steve has said, will lend as much as they can, being professionally greedy and opportunistic. That is their role in the economy, just as the government's role is to restrain their greed for the common good. The government did the opposite, nobody could speak up because of our national self-censorship, everybody piled in including middle-class whites with their eyes on the main chance, and here we are. This was a top-down process, the government borrowing some of the rhetoric of those community leaders in exchange (such was the hope) for votes.

As for causality, as Steve has also said, once a bubble gets going it forgets its past, so the exact cause is somewhat academic. What remains is the self-censorship. And, when a former community leader reaches the Presidency, from where he will quite possibly try to loosen credit even more, the circle of influence will be complete.

Anonymous said...

Not default rates/dollar amounts unfortunately, but loan data by race (amongst other criteria):

Home Mortgage Disclosure Act National Aggregate Report

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...
What exactly is the history of subprime loans? How long have they been in existence and for what purpose? If they were created specifically to assist blacks and hispanics with bad credit, don't the very words "subprime loan crisis" mean "crisis of mortgage policy towards blacks and hispanics"?


lol.. dubious. Sub-prime loans have been around a long time. In fact, they began expanding under the Reagan and Bush I administration, long before our present meltdown, and a lot of whites used and benefitted from them. They continued expanding under Clinton, when Republicans controlled Congress for a significant number of years. This is a message many don't want to hear, being that they only want to beat the "minorities are to blame" drum. See:
http://www.frbsf.org/publications/economics/letter/2001/el2001-38.html
for information of subprimes.

You will note that the link mentions 2 factors as crucial in sub-prime expansion:
(a) The 1980 Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act (DIDMCA) effectively eliminated states' interest rate ceilings on home mortgages where the lender has a first lien, and (b)the Tax Reform Act of 1986 which gave consumers an incentive to shift their consumer borrowing that was not secured by their home into home equity borrowing. During the 1990s, the economic expansion was accompanied by a rapid increase in consumer debt, and home equity borrowing.

Note the early pattern under Reagan and Bush I. Sub-primes were already expanding because of the 2 factors above, not because "forcing" of banks to make "bad loans" to "minorities" as some dubious fantasies would have it..

Anonymous said...

Jockney said...
..it was not a 'few thousand blacks' who got cheap home loans but millions of blacks and Hispanics. Banks were bullied into lending money to bad risk clients to such an extent that the entire credit system was undermined.


A shaky claim. Under the Bush Admin, enforcement of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) which actually governs the dubiously called "affirmative action" loans was weakened. In other words, Bush and his boys took steps to curb CRA coverage from Day 1. After 8 years of that, it is difficult to see any vast incidence of "bullying" banks to make loans to "minorities." In fact, CRA coverage only accounts for about 25% of the overall loan picture, and CRA coverage was actually LEAST likely to indulge in the wild shennigans of other financiers. So banks were not "bullied" to make "bad" loans. See detailed Biz Week article on this:
http://www.businessweek.com/investing/insights/blog/archives/2008/09/community_reinv.html

Also to consider, those who got "high risk" loans paid thru the nose for them (as any borrower should with this type of unorthodox loan) with higher fees and interest rates. No one was giving away the store to assorted minororotees who got the cash. Also note Sailer's own data which show the toxic sub-primes only accounting for 6-12% of the outstanding loan picture. So any attempt to pin the crisis on the "big role" supposedly played by minorities is bogus.



As for the knock on effects. You are right, blacks are not responsible for the collapse of UK banks but bankers from all around the world bought 'securitized' bundles of sub-prime loans because they thought, rightly, that the US Government would bail them out if it all went pear shaped.

But securitizing said loans is the fault of mostly white financiers, who wanted to make big and contnually bigger profits. If anything the CRA "affirmative action" loans were better supervised that the others, and as the B-Week article says: "were less likely to end up securitized into the mortgage-backed securities that have caused so many losses, according to a recent study by the law firm Traiger & Hinckley" See http://www.traigerlaw.com/publications/traiger_hinckley_llp_cra_foreclosure_study_1-7-08.pdf

Blacks and Hispanics, in the words of one writer were not so all powerful that they
"forced investment banks to engineer subprime mortgages into highly leveraged securities.. then tricked all manner of hedge funds and pension funds and financial institutions into buying these lousy products... then persuaded bond-rating agencies to misrepresent the risk associated with these securities."

Note the slew of financial manipulations by white financiers all down the line- from the smiling broker at the front desk, to the bond rating analyst in his comfortable Wall Street office. No one was "bullying" these white financiers to do what they did, whether in the US or the UK. If some in the US assumed the gubment would bail them out, that's another miscalculation (or perhaps not so much of a miscalculation) on their part. Either way, they get bailed out, while "minorities" take the heat as convenient scapegoats some might argue.

Truth said...

"Also in your haste you should actually read Steve's article in which he makes it clear that no one group of buyers is responsible for this mess."

It is not Steve's article which I concerns me in this case (nor in most other cases on which I have commented)it is the corresponding comments.

Steve, while he has his problems, is a good journalist, my favorite internet blogger and more fair than most.

"Congratulations, Troof! What you've proved is that sometimes different banks (or economies) fail for different reasons."

And (totally coincidentally of course) at practically the exact same time.

"Yep, all these banks failing are failing because they lent money to British businesses!"

Well Jack, you know the ultimate problem with this statement is that it can be reversed:

'Yep, all these banks failing are failing because they lent money American blacks.'

It's a bit of a literary palindrome isn't it?

"It takes two to make a loan, speaking of responsibility for one's actions."

Agreed. The difference is that one party generally has an advanced degree in Statistics, Economics, Accounting or business as well as at least 3 years of banking experience, and the other may be a mechanic.

PostScript:

What I did earlier in issuing an inscincere apology was wrong. I offered an apology to do nothing other than to set up a joke. Apologies are too serious and I must now offer an apology for the inauthentic apology I made earlier.

I'm sorry to all who were offended.

KKM

Anonymous said...

>>> Anonymous 9/30/08
>>> It is useless to discuss things with people like Truth or tootalljones. People like these
>>> will never admit basic facts about black and Hispanic crime rates, educational levels,
>>> tendencies to promiscuity, and the like -- let alone their likely partial basis in
>>> genetics. So of course any inferences from those basic facts are also going to be denied. >>>>>>



LOL.. c'mon dude you gotta do better than this drivel.. Plenty of evidence is already on the table that debunks what you say. It seems that now you are reduced to playing the "race card." Whatsa matter? Couldn't argue your case based on data and logic, so now you gona go "Aryan" on us Hoss?... lol.. lol Speaking of IQs, if yours goes up a point, Hoss, SELL!

Anonymous said...

>>>Big Bill>>
Aww, c'mon "truth". Give us some stats, willya? Blow some holes in Stevarino's numbers.

Don't just hang out like some sulky bruthaman and complain. This is a reality-based community here.

But you got to do your homework, bruthaman.

>>>>>

Well, well.. looks like another lamer is played out for lack of logic and data, and is reduced to applying the "race card."

You really gots to do betta on this "ebonics" thang, "Bill"

ROTFLMAO!!!!

Anonymous said...

Truth, no one is talking about "evil blacks" except for you. Please stop dragging the level of discussion down with your sophomoric strawmen.

Anonymous said...

@ too tall jones

I'm the anonymous who asked about the history of subprime loans, and what you wrote jives with what I've researched since I asked the question. Subprime loans came into existence around 1980 with the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act (DIDMCA). But at that time they were given to wealthy folks who were, for example, buying a new house before they had sold their first house. The rates on subprime loans then were a bit higher because there was always a small chance that the borrower's house might burn down or something before he could sell it. But then under Cuomo in at HUD during the Clinton administration subprimes were used to lend to uncreditworthy minorities, and Bush supported this policy when he took office. Then whites got in on the action. The value of homes started to soar as the demand increased from the increasing supply of buyers fuled by 1) uncreditworthy recipients of subprime loans, and 2) illegal alliens buying homes, most probably subprime too. The bankers were happy to give subprime loans, and in some cases they gave them to creditworthy borrowers simply because they could make more money on fees. Then many of the uncreditworthy borrowers started to default, in much higher numbers for blacks and hispanics than whites. And now we have this stupid crisis, which is difficult to fix because so many financial institutions contributed money to congressional campaign funds. That means Congress is thinking about just handing over money to buy debts that the financial companies will surely overvalue. That means that the government will not be able to sell these stocks without a loss, and taxpayers will pay for them. So it does appear that the policies of encouraging blacks and hispanics to take out subprime loans were behind the mortage meltdown. In other words, our socialist policies, in addition to the greed of the financial institutions and the lack of reasonable restraints on campaign funding, preciptated this crisis. If only we could get back to basic well-regulated democracy and capitalism.

- Maxwell

Anonymous said...

Don't know if there is racial/ethnic data here or not. It's not free either.:

National Delinquency Survey

"The National Delinquency Survey is one of the most recognized sources for residential mortgage delinquency and foreclosure rates. Based on a sample of more than 44 million mortgage loans serviced by mortgage companies, commercial banks, thrifts, credit unions and others, NDS provides quarterly delinquency and foreclosure statistics at the national, regional and state levels.

"Delinquency and foreclosure measures are broken out into loan type (prime, subprime, VA and FHA) and fixed and adjustable rate products. At each geographic classification, there are 7 measures: total delinquencies, delinquency by past due category (30-59 days, 60-89 days and 90 days and over), new foreclosures, foreclosure inventory, and seriously delinquent. The total number of loans serviced each quarter, as compiled through the survey, is also included in the data."

Anonymous said...

Maxwell: If only we could get back to basic well-regulated democracy and capitalism.

No, demos kratia - the rule of the mob - is what got us into the mess.

What we need is to get back to being a Republic, but more than half of the [precious few] children born in the USA today are [genetically and/or culturally*] incapable of growing up to become citizens in a Republic.

The subprime meltdown is just the tip of the iceberg which is our looming demographic catastrophe; the more I think about the problem, the more it seems to me that the only hope for Republicanism to thrive in North America will be some sort of a secessionist dissolution of the USA in the next decade or so.

But absent a successful dissolution, the USA is headed straight for a South African or Zimbabwean future.



*PS: People like The Derb seem to be hell-bent on declaring that the genetic determines the cultural - me, I'm a little more romantic, and prefer to think that Freedom of the Will plays a role here, but even I have to admit that the correlation is pretty darned strong.

PPS: It just dawned on me that you intended "well-regulated democracy" to be a pun on the 2nd Amendment, but, even there, I'd urge you to change it to "well-regulated Republic".

Anonymous said...

Well Jack, you know the ultimate problem with this statement is that it can be reversed: 'Yep, all these banks failing are failing because they lent money American blacks.'

Troof, I honestly don't know what the hell you're talking about. I don't see too many people here blaming blacks and Hispanics for the entire problem. The consensus assessment seems to come down to:

1) Politicians (of all races) pushed for more lending to minorities, either to rectify perceived injustices or simply as blatant His/pandering.

2) People of all races, who were unable to afford any home, or the particular home they purchased, took advantage of the dumbed down lending standards.

3) The flood of cheap money led to soaring home prices and a real estate bubble, which lead to massive defaults by people (of all races, but disproportionately minorities) with no money in their homes who didn't want to pay $400,000 for a $300,000 home.

4) Here it must also be said that mass immigration probably contributed somewhat to the problem, through 1) cheap labor to build the homes no one could afford; 2) white flight from areas being taken over by less-desirable minorities; 3) perceived increase in property values due to higher demand because of high immigration levels.

Whites were undeniably part of the problem at every stage, from the politicians pressing to erase lending standards, to the folks borrowing too much money, to the lenders making the loans. I don't think too many people here are suggesting that it's all the fault of the minorities. They were a necessary but not sufficient condition to the cause of the problem.

Anonymous said...

When wanna-be's sign their postings on security blogs as 'l33t-pwnr' you know that are simply wankers.

I get a similar sense when I see people writing 'lol.' ...

However, it is certainly possible that those who made lots of money from the subprime mess would like to divert attention from themselves by blaming minorities for the whole mess.

Convenient scapegoats. Make the taxpayers pay and give them someone to blame.

Anonymous said...

Truth -

If you want to blame greedy crooks, rather than low-income non-whites, check out this website and report back to us:

http://www.predatorix.com

You'll find the kind of villains I think you're looking for.

Anonymous said...

Do handguns 'contribute significantly' to murder rates? If not why are their less murders in London which has a much higher crime rate than in New York (and fewer blacks BTW)? --Truth

If Truth thinks the answer is keeping handguns out of hands black, let him know that the Founding Fathers were wholly with him on this point. The problem isn't the Second Amendment, but the Fourteenth.

White folks don't believe black folks are responsible for the mortgage crisis, or the murder rate, for that matter. Truth is (pardon the pun), white folks don't think black folks are responsible for anything.

Truth said...

The largest bank in Iceland and Scotland are gone; the largest banks in Switzerland, Germany and Denmark by this time next month...

http://www.prisonplanet.com/calls-for
-new-eu-financial-order-increase-as-
total-meltdown-becomes-likely.html

...GOD-DAMN THAT TYRONE, HE JUST NEEDED TO BY A HOUSE, DIDN'T HE?!

Truth said...

Here's another one for the guy that asked for links:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/
comment/ambroseevans_pritchard/311899
4/Financial-Crisis-So-much-for-
tirades-against-American-greed.html

For those of you who do not read the links I'll post the sub-headline for you:

"Ambrose Evans-Pritchard says it is ironic that European banks have turned out to be deeper in debt than their US counterparts."

Wake up people, the alarm clark is ringing!

JohnLindsay said...

"Asians are the best for repaying loans"

Does that also inlcude whites?!

I guess no one seems to know about the high number of Asian students who run up high credit card debts and then return to their home countries leaving credit cards high and dry.