From LaVern F. Isely
Monroe
To the editor:
AP wrote an excellent article titled "32 States Trail U.S. in Job Recovery" by Paul Wiseman, AP Economics writer, which was in The Monroe Times on July 3, concerning the Number One problem in our economy: the loss of jobs. While we are gradually regaining some of the jobs we lost in 2008, one of the main problems pointed out in the article was that construction is running at barely half of the early and mid-2000s.
In those days, they were making home loans that were called subprime, which meant that the home was appraised higher by the bank than the home was worth. Then after they completed the loan, many times the bank sold the loan to a bigger bank out of state for the commissions. The object of making a good loan is to get to where both the bank and the customer are benefiting and have the lowest amount of bankruptcies. While this has gotten better in some localities, others haven't done as well. Some banks today are still selling with no money down and then selling the home loan, as well as the car loans, out of state.
What should be done, in other articles I've read, when buying, particularly a home, is to have 10 percent down and to keep the loan local. We heard a ridiculous story on CBS' "60 Minutes" about robo-signing and how the investment banks used several different people all signing the same name of "Linda Green."
While I think a lot of these practices have slowed down because of the Dodd -Frank bill, I don't believe they have stopped. I read an article in Bloomberg Businessweek titled "Markets/Finance: Worst. Party. Ever." in the June 30- July 6, issue by Nick Summers with Jacob Barach, Joseph Ciolli and Eric Lam. On page 39, I quote: "Trading volume continues to dwindle, part of a years long decline, and the VIX index, a measure of expected volatility, is near the lowest levels ever recorded." I brought this article to Rep. Mark Pocan's attention when he was in Monroe July 2 at the Monroe Public Library.
Anyone can look up the complete article for themselves. At the end of this well-attended meeting, Mayor Bill Ross said, "Isn't this fun." I agree. I thanked Rep. Pocan for coming to Monroe, as well as talking on Sly's program on WEKZ-FM.
Monroe
To the editor:
AP wrote an excellent article titled "32 States Trail U.S. in Job Recovery" by Paul Wiseman, AP Economics writer, which was in The Monroe Times on July 3, concerning the Number One problem in our economy: the loss of jobs. While we are gradually regaining some of the jobs we lost in 2008, one of the main problems pointed out in the article was that construction is running at barely half of the early and mid-2000s.
In those days, they were making home loans that were called subprime, which meant that the home was appraised higher by the bank than the home was worth. Then after they completed the loan, many times the bank sold the loan to a bigger bank out of state for the commissions. The object of making a good loan is to get to where both the bank and the customer are benefiting and have the lowest amount of bankruptcies. While this has gotten better in some localities, others haven't done as well. Some banks today are still selling with no money down and then selling the home loan, as well as the car loans, out of state.
What should be done, in other articles I've read, when buying, particularly a home, is to have 10 percent down and to keep the loan local. We heard a ridiculous story on CBS' "60 Minutes" about robo-signing and how the investment banks used several different people all signing the same name of "Linda Green."
While I think a lot of these practices have slowed down because of the Dodd -Frank bill, I don't believe they have stopped. I read an article in Bloomberg Businessweek titled "Markets/Finance: Worst. Party. Ever." in the June 30- July 6, issue by Nick Summers with Jacob Barach, Joseph Ciolli and Eric Lam. On page 39, I quote: "Trading volume continues to dwindle, part of a years long decline, and the VIX index, a measure of expected volatility, is near the lowest levels ever recorded." I brought this article to Rep. Mark Pocan's attention when he was in Monroe July 2 at the Monroe Public Library.
Anyone can look up the complete article for themselves. At the end of this well-attended meeting, Mayor Bill Ross said, "Isn't this fun." I agree. I thanked Rep. Pocan for coming to Monroe, as well as talking on Sly's program on WEKZ-FM.
