Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Homelessness in the USA

Many people are complaining about folks who are homeless; living directly on the street or in tents pitched in public spaces. The reasons for the homelessness and the solutions are also complained about, if discussed at all.

The cost of living indoors started to skyrocket in the 1980s, and that problem will only be addressed by providing sufficient quantities of seriously affordable housing. The cost and vulnerability of home loans can only be mitigated by re-instituting, and enforcing, fair and equitable regulations for mortgages.

There have always been homeless folks, a few who refuse housing assistance because they believe they are living the life they prefer, The current increase in homelessness started in the 1980s when most of the regulatory environment for home mortgages, that was the Glass-Steagall Act, was repealed. Another reason for an increase in homeless folks was the abandonment of the government housing for folks with debilitating disabilities; many of the institutions involved were found to be seriously deficient and were closed rather than improved.

The business of home loans was taken from the reliable, boring domain of the Savings and Loan financial institutions and given to the financial services industries that are, "Wall Street." That was the key to a meteoric rise in the cost of living indoors; maximized profits replaced affordable home ownership as the primary goal of home loans (mortgages).

The situation was made ready for worse gaming/gambling with home loans when the last of Glass-Steagall was repealed in 1999; made the, "Great Recession," almost inevitable. The, "banksters," originating and trading in mortgages began to include those whose financial institutions specialized in investments that promised greater returns; involved greater, much greater, risk. These riskier, gaming/gambling, investment instruments had not previously been allowed to be mingled with consumer loans; primarily mortgages.

Elizabeth Warren, one of the architects of the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, has (once again) proposed solutions. You can try to place the blame on a state's governor, but that's not where the problem originates, nor is it where the problem will be resolved.

See also: United Way ALICE (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed).


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