Bush Tax Cuts

So much crap is circulating over the Bush tax cuts and how we can't let them expire cuz it will hurt the economy.
I have argued for years with bozo's on various blogs that claimed the tax cuts where the reason for the economic growth the US experienced over the past decade.
My argument was it had nothing to do with tax cuts but rather cheap credit. The ability to borrow and borrow and borrow against fictitious asset values.

Watching what folks, governments and corporations were borrowing and how much they were leveraging themselves helped me better understand how fucked we really are.
Case in point: I looked at two homes that just foreclosed.
The first one the couple paid $160k for it back in 2003 and after refinancing several times ended up owing $294k by the spring of 2009.
So they pulled $134k in 6 years time. Let's put that a different way. That comes out to $22k a year or $423 a week. Not bad.

The next one the couple paid $120k back in 2001 and like many others refinanced it to death till they owed $247k and could no longer service the debt and went to foreclosure in July.
That's $130k in 9 years or $14k per year or $269 per week that this couple had to spend on vacations, clothes, cars, Xboxes, iPhones or whatever.
Neither of these homes had additions put on or does not appear to have had any type of remodeling done in the past decade.
These are just the tip of the iceberg and I could give oodles more examples but I think my point has been made.
This is why I say RE is dead and will continue it's down trend (10 to 20 years) till we reach a price level we haven't seen since the early 80's because for the past decade so many have lived off what I like to call "Unearned Income".
It is going to be impossible to replace that income.
But but housing prices will go up!
Sorry, but nope.
Prior to any housing boom the central bank lowers interest rates which in turn creates an easy credit environment that leads to a demand for goods (homes). Today the dipshits at our central bank can't lower the interest rates cuz they are already at 0% and to top it off, folks, corporations and governments are already over leveraged and can barely service the debt they have accumulated over the past decades. This is the reason we are heading into a deflationary cycle. Study what Japan has and is still going through.

And this is NH............ California along with many other states saw a much greater rise in RE values giving those that had a pen and could sign their name the ability to buy all kinds of cool stuff with their "Unearned Income".
I used to get a chuckle watching those car auctions out in Cal and the goofballs with their fake boobed girlfriends biding $180k on an old Camaro that today they are lucky if it pulls $18k. Where do you think that money came from? Unearned income.