Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Bubbles Forever

NEW HAVEN – You might think that we have been living in a post-bubble world since the collapse in 2006 of the biggest-ever worldwide real-estate bubble and the end of a major worldwide stock-market bubble the following year. But talk of bubbles keeps reappearing – new or continuing housing bubbles in many countries, a new global stock-market bubble, a long-term bond-market bubble in the United States and other countries, an oil-price bubble, a gold bubble, and so on.

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Sunday, July 14, 2013

Owning a Home Isn’t Always a Virtue


ENCOURAGING homeownership has been considered a national goal at least since “Own Your Own Home Day” was introduced in 1920 by various business and civic groups as part of a National Thrift Week. The newly popular word “homeownership” represented a goal and a virtue for every good citizen — to get out of the tenements and into one’s own home. Homeownership was thought to encourage planning, discipline, permanency and community spirit.

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