How to Fix the Economy

A week ago, I went grocery shopping and by mistake, threw London Broil in my cart, instead of the Sirloin cut I had intended to buy. Unsure of how to cook it so it didn’t taste like shoe leather, I stuck it in my slow cooker with some pretty awesome Omaha Steak seasoning and a can of coke and decided to cook the living shit out of it. It didn’t help. In fact, the whole experience is best summed up by my daughter who took one bite and said, ‘It smells better than it tastes.” After shoveling it all into the trash, I got to thinking about the economy.

I know, there is no real link here, but it’s a pretty good indication of how my brain has been working lately. I could go into great detail about my thought process and how I went from shoe leather tasting cuts of meat to the bailout, but to be honest, I’d kind of like you to come back and I really don’t want to scare you with my craziness.

Anyway, here are my thoughts: Why hasn’t the Government forced the banks to convert all of the subprime mortgages to 30 year fixed mortgages, with the bailout money? This seems to me to be the most obvious solution. After all, the whole reason the economy went to Hell in a hand basket, is because of the Sub Prime mortgages.

So we convert all of the mortgages and those people who can afford the new rate, get to keep their home without having to worry about their mortgages resetting to an astronomical amount in a few months. Those who can’t afford the 30 year rate, lose their home because they shouldn’t have bought the damn thing in the first place. This weeds out those people that bought 500,000 dollar homes on a 40,000 a year salary and as a bonus, kicks the ass of those greedy assholes that gave them the mortgage in the first place. It doesn’t affect homeowners who have been fiscally responsible because they are already in decent mortgages and they have the advantage of seeing house prices rise again, instead of seeing their investment tank. All of those people who were ‘tricked’ into refinancing into sub prime mortgages also get a do-over. See? Win win.

Instead, we see the bailout money sitting in the pockets of the banks. By design, the bailout was intended to ease concerns so that banks would loosen up the purse strings and start lending again. How can it do that, when foreclosures are still going up? With no accountability or stipulations, the 750 billion dollars is sitting in a big ole piggy bank doing nothing but acting as a security net for the idiots that started this mess in the first place. DUMB.

So, Obama? If you are listening, make the banks convert the mortgages. Don’t bother with this bridges and roads, creating jobs bullshit. Fix the subprime mess first and the trickle down effect will be higher house prices, more profit and more jobs. As a bonus, it won’t cost the tax payers any more money than has already been spent.

If you keep giving the banks money, you’re just putting seasoning on shoe leather. It may smell good but it’s gonna taste like shit.