Greed has raised it's ugly head in the USA sub-prime mortgage crisis. What else but greed could have mortgage brokers, bankers and other lending institutions convince naive consumers that they can borrow money they can never hope to repay. Why are consumers so naive? Greed! They want to be naive! They want to believe they can buy that bigger house, car, pool and ATV. And what about the lending institutions who took those worthless mortgages and packaged them up into Real estate Investment Trusts that consumers in the stock markets thought were backed by real solid real estate? Deception, greed, naivete; the worlds monetary system at it's best.
1.8 million homes in default. Over 8 million homes with no or negative equity. Investment Banks falling like house flies. And with the massive 12 trillion dollar devaluation of the housing market, comes a major loss of real estate taxes which impacts every local community.
What follows is more of the truth. You may not want to hear it...but it is the truth!
National and Consumer debt is sucking the life out of our economies. If you want to survive difficult economic times…reduce your debt.
The most current figures I could research about debt are as follows… USA Debt today: $9,789,490,720,019. USA per Person: $32,119. Canada Net Debt 2007: $508,109,000,000. Canada per Person: $15,217
While some economists are telling us that the Canadian economy is strong enough and regulated enough to survive the US monetary meltdown, we will experience the aftershocks of a global economic crisis.
As the USA economy attempts to weather this recent storm of greed and deception in its financial institutions, massive infusions of cash will be needed. While the American government is proposing millions of dollars in bailouts for these institutions (and nothing it seems for the consumer) foreign governments and corporations are coming to the rescue.
According to the latest data, I was able to find, 785 U.S. businesses were acquired by foreign investors for $129 billion this year through August.
A few of the foreign investments now buying up the USA are:
Abu Dhabi's bid to buy 20% of the NASDAQ
Abu Dhabi's $7.5−billion bailout of Citigroup
China's $3−billion purchase of the Blackstone Group
Abu Dhabi Investment Authority's purchase of 9% of U.S. private equity
firm Apollo Management for an undisclosed sum.
While foreign investment is regulated some what here in Canada, Canada and Canadian assets continue to be purchased by foreign interests (Vale INCO as an example).
The Bible is so clear about our obsession with money. It says that "the love of money is the root of all evil." Bigger, better, more, is at the heart of our consumptive society. We must reduce unnecessary consumption, learn contentment and invest in our world rather than make withdrawals from our world. It is imperative that we teach our children how to add value to the world through serving and giving rather than take value from our world through constant consumption.
The values I have just expressed are so counter-cultural...but they are the start of healing our devastated economy and following God's economic principles as outlined in the bible. Do not be in debt. Be generous. Save some. Live off the rest of your money.
While economists debate, we as people must become much more disciplined and directed in our spending. As people we must learn to trust in God as our source of supply and not the world’s monetary system. We could at least, check our Bible as much as we check our stocks.
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