Chief National Association of Realtors economist David Lereah surprised many by his announcement that he was leaving his position last week. Lereah had angered and been pilloried by many bloggers for insisting on providing the rosiest of housing forecasts in the face of evidence that housing was crashing around his ears. He worked for the Association that had the gall to put out newspaper ads saying that this was still a wonderful time to buy or sell a house (and pay a commission to a Realtor.)
Now that he’s leaving, he has made an 180 degree about-face and declared the housing market to be in the worst recession since the Great Depression. “We’re going to have negative home prices in 2007,” he says.
Oh rly? And this on the heels of announcement after announcement that housing had turned the corner?
It’s because of assholes like this that I despise economists. So many of them prostitute themselves to the highest bidder by putting out economic bullshit spin and painting rosy pictures that even people like myself who are untrained in economics but read a lot can see right through. Things like gargantuan trade deficits, huge budget deficits, staggering levels of consumer debt, the looming entitlement crises, outsourced jobs, and outrageous housing prices somehow get spun into things that are good for the economy, when the truth is as plain as the nose on one’s face that our country is digging itself ever deeper into a point of financial collapse that threatens our very standard of living. If that day comes to pass you can thank shills like Lereah and Alan “now’s a great time to get an ARM mortgage” Greenspan for it.
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Hilarious.
And don’t forget in your list the “top-heavy” aging population that’s we won’t have enough worker bees to support (or is that what you mean by “looming entitlement crisis”?), and which already begun to put a huge strain on our already strained health care system (and the ever growing problems of obesity/diabetes) – but the bright side is that cancer rates appear to be dropping!
Yes, I do think that things are better in some other countries (ie: the ones that are both fiscally responsible and at the same time socially responsible)
yep, that’s what i meant by looming entitlement crises (Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security).
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