The Great Depression and the Present Economic Crisis

America is quickly becoming desensitized to its moral obligation and duty to repay debts. In fact, many American’s now feel that they are owed something regardless of their behavior and actions. This moral path could lead to an economic crisis far worse than anything we have seen.

In the movie Cinderella Man Russell Crowe plays James Braddock, a.k.a Cinderella man. This movie is a story about a poor ex-prizefighter during the great depression. Unable to pay his bills struggling to feed and clothe his family he is forced to go on public relief. Driven by love and honor James Braddock returns to the ring to become a legend and a symbol to many American’s during the time, proving that hard work and sacrifice, pay off when he defeats the heavyweight champion. In a memorable scene, James Braddock returns to the public assistance office to return the money he was lent when he was down and out.

This brings me to today's economic crisis, a majority of Americans did not lose their homes trying to feed, clothe, and keep their children warm. In fact, of the entire country 6% of homeowners are behind on their mortgage, most of them are losing their homes as a result of irresponsible behavior that has caused many others that did not participate in the irresponsible behavior to lose their jobs, 401k's, and retirements. As Larry Roberts author of The Great Housing Bubble puts it, a majority of American’s are losing their homes because they “were lured by the free money accumulating as appreciation and took out an additional $400,000 in home equity lines of credit and refinancing and lived the good life. This neighbor was driving around in new cars, taking vacations, buying expensive toys and pretending to be rich,” while others sacrificed, even spent less time with family and friends in order to pay down their mortgage and in hopes of a better future. Now, current legislation endorsed by John McCain, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and others seeks to use the tax dollars of the prudent to pay for the imprudent and worst of all the imprudent are beginning to feel entitled and even proud of the plunders. Furthermore, this legislation leads to others saying why not me and the potential for the number of bad loans to increase exponentially as the banks tell people that they need to quit paying their mortgage to qualify for the modification.

“When the thirteen colonies were still a part of England, Professor Alexander Tyler wrote about the fall of the Athenian republic over two thousand years previous to that time:A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves money from the public treasure. From that moment on the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most money from the public treasury, with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy followed by a dictatorship.The average age of the world's great civilizations has been two hundred years. These nations have progressed through the following sequence: from bondage to spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependency, from dependency back to bondage.”1

1Alexander Tyler http://www.mcsm.org/democracy1.html In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment for non-profit research and educational purposes only. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml