Comment puis-je dire?

From the Lower Hudson online: Lots of blame to go around in subprime mortgage crisis.

For months Marie Chantale Joseph and her husband, Daniel, have been unsuccessfully trying to refinance their home before their interest rate spikes in April.

Already, Daniel, a taxi driver, is working 18 hours a day and on weekends to pay the approximately $4,800 a month they owe, and Marie, a babysitter, works as many hours as she can.

"In my country it is different. No one can come and take your home away from you," said Marie Chantale, who must pay about $8,000 a month beginning in April, or lose her home to foreclosure. "Here, if they know you don't know what you are doing, they take advantage of you."

Firstly, the idea that Haiti is more ethical than the US is absurd. We're talking about literally the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere which also has the dubious distinction of being a failed state.

Secondly, we're talking about a baby-sitter and a cab-driver buying a $500,000 house with monthly payments of $8,000.

Let me repeat that for emphasis: a baby-sitter and a cab-driver with $8,000 monthly payments. (That's $96,000 a year for 30 years, or roughly $3 million!)

Here's the "much esteemed" Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances, (PDF link) where you can figure out for yourself that even a family in the top 5% of incomes cannot possibly make those payments. They would literally be scraping by, and hope to God and cross their hearts that nothing goes wrong.

Ponder that! No fuckups for 30 straight years -- no medical problems, no unexpected expenses, no recessions, no layoffs, absolute perfection for 30 years.

What is easier to believe?

That they had no clue of what they were doing, or they were gaming the system, and after the shit hits the fan, they fuck off back to Haiti?

You can decide that for yourself!