The Growth of Wealth in Modern America

Same it always was but moreso; wealth ever goes to the monied classes at the expense of the lower classes. The Republican free market, instead of growing wealth, actually destroys what little wealth the lower classes have managed to eke out. Bravo, George W. Bush for having neither brains nor balls, a complete failure of leadership! This is an historical accomplishment:

The median price of American homes is expected to fall this year for the first time since federal housing agencies began keeping statistics in 1950.

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As to how this was accomplished, it started like this:

ON its way to becoming the nation’s largest mortgage lender, the Countrywide Financial Corporation encouraged its sales force to court customers over the telephone with a seductive pitch that seldom varied. “I want to be sure you are getting the best loan possible,” the sales representatives would say.

But providing “the best loan possible” to customers wasn’t always the bank’s main goal, say some former employees. Instead, potential borrowers were often led to high-cost and sometimes unfavorable loans that resulted in richer commissions for Countrywide’s smooth-talking sales force, outsize fees to company affiliates providing services on the loans, and a roaring stock price that made Countrywide executives among the highest paid in America.

Countrywide’s entire operation, from its computer system to its incentive pay structure and financing arrangements, is intended to wring maximum profits out of the mortgage lending boom no matter what it costs borrowers, according to interviews with former employees and brokers who worked in different units of the company and internal documents they provided. One document, for instance, shows that until last September the computer system in the company’s subprime unit excluded borrowers’ cash reserves, which had the effect of steering them away from lower-cost loans to those that were more expensive to homeowners and more profitable to Countrywide.

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Speaking of the Times:

There seems to be an easy hack of TimeSelect, courtesy of the Times. Once registered, set up that new feature, "My Times". Therein, choose columnists; what were normally behind the T$ wall now appear to be fully accetable, no charge. Can this be, though? Time(s) will tell.....