HAMP which is the Home Affordable Modification Program, was set up by the Obama administration to find ways to reduce foreclosures.
So far it has helped a mere 5% of those heading into foreclosure. Some would argue that the program is a failure.
Wall Street has had a decent run since March of '09. However its important to note that the ordinary person with 401K, IRA, or investment portfolio is still more than likely less asset wealthy than they were a few years ago.
If we look at the unemployment rate, foreclosures, the aforementioned portfolio devaluation, it is easy to see that the middle class is shrinking.
McClatchy: Mortgage foreclosures still swamping federal efforts to help
More than 5 million mortgages have been caught in foreclosure proceedings since the economy began slipping in 2007, and an estimated 8 million to 13 million more could follow in the next five years. The Treasury's goal is to help modify 3 million to 4 million mortgages in three years, but only about 1 percent of that number have completed the process.
6 comments:
Shrinking is an under statement no offense. Vanishing permanently is more like it if present trends continue. The top 2% have no need it seems for millions of Americans anymore period. It won't be long before we'll all be migrating to other places like the Mexicans who used to flood into America looking for work. If u don't have a job thats not either exportable or easily filled with undocumented illegal immigrant indentured labor your screwed. Its that simple. Most of the manufacturing jobs are gone or going and that leaves a huge hole in the economy. The simple truth here is not everyone is handy or a rocket scientist and Gov'ts are already bulging with drones and unless your politically connected don't bother even trying to get one of those cozy positions. Remember, Donald trumps's show a few yrs. ago "YOUR FIRED!" Well thats about it for large segments of America today.
I certainly agree, and don't have a whole lot more to add. I suspect there will be pockets in America where there will be boom work. I live in an area where state government is huge and so consequently its a relatively stable area, simply because there's consistent economic activity. All of the peripheral business can be maintained, food, housing, schools, medicine, etc. if that changes and the state government dries up, the area becomes more like Flint.
One could argue that we live in a welfare state, especially someone like me.
Even a welfare state needs productive Enterprises to tax to support it. Look at what happened to the Soviet Union. The present trend is a spiral downward. Wall st. might be in NYC but the cash flow is going Int'l not into America to create Enterprises and jobs here.
I know of people who leave NY because the taxes are so high. Tell you what, if you tell me your school taxes I'll tell you mine, I bet mine are twice as high. Outrageous where I live.
My Real Estate taxes on an 80X62 lot and 3 br. 2 story 80 yr. old house are $6,300. People are leaving NJ as well because of taxes here. The irony is many that leave are actually part of the reason why our taxes are so high. NJ has the same problem Calif. and many other States with extremely powerful public service unions are now experiencing. The retiring public workers have enormous retirement packages almost as good as those for Corp. executives. I know for example a few friends of mine I went to school with that are retired firemen and police locally and they live in Fla., Calif, Costa Rica now because they all told me taxes in NJ are too high! Yea they sure are and largely because of their retirement packages! All three retired with the tax payers on the hook for, get this, 3/4's of their last paychecks and fully paid for solid GOLD health benefits. One of them was a fire cheif, he gets 80K a yr. plus full health, he's 58! How's that for a great deal and there are literally hundreds of thousands just like him in NJ today and as the baby boomer retire its going to get far worse! NJ has 35 billion in unfunded pension ( just pension not plus benefits) obligations. The average salary in NJ in the private sector today is 35K and going down. Ca., and other States have exactly the same situation. We just elected a Goper Gov. supposedly to deal with this. How? Bankruptcy? If the State declares itself bankrupt it will then not be able to raise $$ for anything. It's a terrible situation and I'm going to eventually sell and move myself before the collapse. But you have to laugh at the chutzpah of retired public employees living high off the taxpayers for the rest of their lives moving because they can't afford the taxes? I just chuckled when these guys complained to me. WTF! Some folks just do not get it at all.
Shite, you pay MORE than me in taxes. We pay roughly 6K. That's amazing. I'm personally hoping we can hold out here for 5 to 10 years. One of the situations with this area is that the average income is going down, just as you note in Jersey. Same thing here, the state workers retire with the full benefits and are replaced with lower paid workers or I suspect some info jobs are migrating to India and such. Now there's a thought for you, we'll have government bureaucracies run in India and Indonesia.
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