Why should people who don't pay their debts get a break? What about all the folks that stay current with their debt obligations?
How about people don't take on debts that they can't pay. Or better yet just go back to paying cash.
We reward the wrong behaviors in this country today. Don't make your mortgage payment, no problem. Uncle Sugar will bail you out. Went to college and got a useless liberal arts degree and went thousands in debt. No problem, we'll just wipe that debt out and call it even.
Well, for one, we've bailed out millionaires and everyone with a 401k as well as foreign governments and banks.
For two, we've bailed out the UAW.
For three, we've bailed out teachers and other government workers.
Right now, we're requiring some of us to buy a product while favored others get a pass.
And we've done it by taking the very money out of the economy that could have been earned to make those payments.
Would you sit there and watch your neighbors house burn if they caused it? Then, wait until it burned yours?
Did you ever wonder why PMI didn't cover all those mortgages?
If someone had a flat in the middle of the road or were broke down because they were negligent, would you just sit in the traffic jam or maybe, at some point, help them out if only to help yourself?
The world has lots of responsible people who, through no fault of their own, lose jobs, or get sick. Or have bad luck. Heck with them?
The world has lots of irresponsible people who make out all the time off of good people.
The world has lots of people in between.
In the mean time, the enormous debt out there is simply going into the banks servicing old business.
In the mean time, any new activity folks might spend that on, goes begging.
Sometimes, people are in situations, their own doings, someone elses fault, half and half, and it simply makes sense to declare bankruptcy to get rid of a debt you simply can't ever pay. Some times, it's better to help someone start over than to just slip under the waves, giving up because there is no hope.
My argument isn't for people like me who lost a house or have taken on more than they can handle as the economy soured. My argument is, if you think about it, for the betterment of everyone, including those wonderful, responsible souls who never miss a payment or only pay cash and stay within their nice little box at all times, risking little, if anything, and expecting less. People who very much benefited from when times were good for everybody.
Maybe the 'good' people's reward is that houses in their neighborhoods stop falling into foreclosure. Maybe their reward is a raise as the economy actually recovers. Maybe their sterling credit report means lower rights while us ne'er do wells have to pay higher rates. Maybe their reward is in a general recovery that stops the general decline in what is a country that belongs to us all.
Maybe we just do it because it is where the help is needed.
Or, we just keep doing what we're doing and hope for different results.
