Palast, an economist and true journalist, breaks it down.
Look, my wife and I are now in the process of buying a house. We'd like to think we're fairly intelligent -- four Ivy-League degrees between us (two each), for whatever that's worth. Guess what? It has taken every single neuron we have -- without having to work three jobs, without kids, with family in the business, etc.: i.e., with every possible advantage of class (connections, that is: lawyers we know, etc.) and relative wealth -- to figure out all of the fine-print bullshit and force people to take us seriously. As in: sitting in an office for three hours going through every single line item, every single piece of fine print, knowing what to ask, being able to test various mortgage brokers, etc. Knowing enough to ask questions that will let people realize we're not low-hanging fruit. And so on. It's been a full research project, and we're still not sure we're not going to get ripped off.
So, for all of those willing to blame the "stupid people who took subprime loans," uh, yeah, right.
Look, my wife and I are now in the process of buying a house. We'd like to think we're fairly intelligent -- four Ivy-League degrees between us (two each), for whatever that's worth. Guess what? It has taken every single neuron we have -- without having to work three jobs, without kids, with family in the business, etc.: i.e., with every possible advantage of class (connections, that is: lawyers we know, etc.) and relative wealth -- to figure out all of the fine-print bullshit and force people to take us seriously. As in: sitting in an office for three hours going through every single line item, every single piece of fine print, knowing what to ask, being able to test various mortgage brokers, etc. Knowing enough to ask questions that will let people realize we're not low-hanging fruit. And so on. It's been a full research project, and we're still not sure we're not going to get ripped off.
So, for all of those willing to blame the "stupid people who took subprime loans," uh, yeah, right.