It is time for reporters following Mitt to start asking him some questions about housing, a serious problem today.
Housing is a topic that Mitt should know something about. After all, his father George served as the nation's housing secretary during the Nixon administration. And Mitt currently owns three homes, according to Zillow.
Two of Mitt's current homes -- the lakefront compound in New Hampshire and the beachfront mansion in La Jolla -- sit on the water. So surely Mitt can sympathize with the millions of Americans whose homes are "under water," worth less than their mortgages because of the dramatic decline of housing values. Then there are the millions more who have lost their homes to foreclosure.
Wall Street's reckless behavior crashed the economy. In the past six years, housing prices nationwide have fallen by a third. Families have lost nearly $7 trillion of home equity. About 15 million homeowners owe $700 billion more on their mortgages than their homes are worth. Millions of middle-class families have watched their major source of wealth stripped away, their neighborhoods decimated, and their future economic security destroyed.
What's Mitt's response? In an interview last October with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, based in a state where foreclosures have reached epidemic levels, Mitt said: "Don't try to stop the foreclosure process. Let it run its course and hit the bottom." Then he suggested: "Allow investors to buy homes, put renters in them, fix the homes up and let it turn around and come back up."
Shortly after this interview, Mitt further displayed his faith in the free market at a round table discussion at a hotel in Tampa, Florida, another state where housing prices have plummeted and has been hit hard by foreclosures. Candice Tammey told Romney her situation, a plight familiar to millions of American families. She lost her job and asked her bank to negotiate a loan modification so she could keep paying her mortgage. The bank refused, so Tammey, out of options, stopped paying her mortgage and faced being foreclosed.
"It will get better," Romney told her, according to CNN's online video stream of the event. "It will not always be like this."
Taking the side of the bank industry lobby, Romney also wants to dismantle the Dodd-Frank law, and the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which strengthened protections for consumers, including homeowners, against predatory and abusive corporate lenders.
Across the country, millions of "under water" voters -- Democrats and Independents and even some Republicans -- are desperate. This is particularly true in many key swing states -- including Florida, Nevada, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, and Colorado. These voters, for whom the American Dream has become a nightmare, could be an important voting bloc in the November election.
The best solution is for the federal government to require banks to write down the principal on their mortgages so that their mortgages are worth market value. If mortgages were reset, this would not only fix the foreclosure crisis but also pump $71 billion into the economy annually and create over one million jobs a year.
The Obama administration has proposed a "principal reduction" fix, but only on a voluntary basis. Obama needs to ratchet up his demands on the banks, require them to modify "under water" loans that have put millions of families in economic jeopardy through not fault of their own, and contrast his approach with Romney's "Let it run its course and hit the bottom" approach.
By taking on the banking lobby, and helping millions of homeowners who are suffering because of Wall Street's risky and illegal practices, Obama will help guarantee his re-election in November. Then Mitt can go back to his homes in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and California -- and perhaps buy another one in the Cayman Islands, where he can visit his money.
Peter Dreier teaches politics and chairs the Urban & Environmental Policy Department at Occidental College. His new book, The 100 Greatest Americans of the 20th Century: A Social Justice Hall of Fame, was just published by Nation Books.
Not an economic question, and not a moral question that allows those to judge homeowners in foreclosure as deadbeats. It's a crime, legal and moral, that these banks are collecting bailout money, insurance and legal fees and STILL kick people out. We need leaders that will enforce the law and stop the damage in a FAIR way not just for Wall St's sake or for election politics.
Both Obama and Romney want to turn a blind eye to the fraud but Romney wants to start blowing up the next bubble. Dreier is right; this is the issue that could lose the election for Obama when it shouldn't be close. If he wins he needs to be held accountable; if Romney wins say hello to a a nation of renters and our global landlords.
judge for themselves their roll in America. There is nothing wrong with earning or inheriting wealth. I have always known if I wanted something, I had to work for it. There is no room for this petty jealousy. It should'nt matter if a person is wealthy or not. Just because he owns more homes than one, he is not responsbile for this economic disaster. And because he is wealthy does not mean that he dosn't understand the economic hardships we Americans are facing. It is a hard job managing money. America was founded on the theory that we could do or become anything we wanted. Now you criticize this man because he is one of the lucky ones. What a twisted mind. Romney may not be the best canidate, but with him there is just the slighest hope that he will change the course the present administration has taken us. Under Obama things have gotten worse and his programs do not work.Some social issues may have been "solved", but this administration does not have what it takes to get us headed back in the right direction. That is jobs. Where has Obama been?.......Out on the golf course or flying in AF1 campaigning. Who is minding the store? .... No one. Now don't tell me that he doesn't understand wealth for he is or will become wealthy while in office
I'm not wild about either candidate this year, and I find it hysterical to watch as two millionaires try to paint each other as out of touch with the middle class.
Question for Mr. Dreier - why am I supposed to be more concerned with what Romney has done with HIS money than with what Obama has done with MINE?
Meanwhile, each candidate touts a "plan" for the economy. Romney touting tax breaks for the rich who don't need them, and Obama touting the same old "tax and spend" plans. Again, I think both plans are highly flawed, but hasn't anyone on the President's team informed him that after 3 1/2 years, he's supposed to have more than a plan to show? He should have some actual results.
Many people lost their jobs because of outsourcing and then eventually lost their house. That sucks.But, many people bit off more than they could chew using interest only adjustables .They knew under conventional fixed rates they could not afford that much house, but for ego reasons in some cases they grabbed the brass ring knowing full well everything had to run smoothly to maintain that lifestyle. Crap hits the fan end of '08 and start of '09 and that was the beginning of the end for some. It truly was some people's fault. Let's talk about jobs. Jobs help people maintain a lifestyle for those who live within their means. I would not blame Romney or Obama for some Americans poor financial decisions.
What are they so afraid of???
Before the banks are required to absorb the losses of the people who got in late, perhaps all the people who got in early should be required to turn over their profits to those same banks. Sauce for the goose, etc., right?
I'll just say a few words about hard work and success: The idea that progressives want to punish success is a complete myth. In truth, progressivism doesn't even work if there are no rich and successful people in the system. Therefore, progress is not measured in how much can be taken from the rich, but rather how many are able to share that sort of success. It's a given that this nation is at its best when more of us are able to earn a comfortable living. It is also well-known what enables people to become successful: access to quality schooling, robust infrastructure, robust social support networks. When there are more successful people who got good jobs because they went to good schools, and then went to work for strong companies supported by solid infrastructure. The beauty if it is that progress is a self-reinforcing cycle -- support success, successful people earn more and pay more taxes, enabling reinforcement of support structure. Progress is not about punishing success, Progress is success. Without prosperity, you have no progress. Progress is the reward for hard work. It's what made this country great after the second world war. There's no reason we can't do that again, but even better.
And...it doesn't require an explanation.
:)