Now before everyone jumps on me about 19th century brutal slavery, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the type of slavery that existed 2000+ years ago. A man borrows money. If he can't pay his debt, he becomes a slave and can be sold to whoever to pay off the debt. The slave is given room & board but is not required to be paid. If the slave does not want to work, you can beat him to force him to work. Most masters at the time would give little amounts of money to their slaves that worked well and eventually they could buy their freedom. Now bring into todays world. Doesnt that seem fair that if a man borrows money to buy a house and then cant pay or refuses to pay because the house went down in value, shouldnt he be required to pay the difference in the price? But he isnt. Instead the burden of debt is paid by other people. People that work hard for their money. In essence we are now the slaves working for that mans debt! When I travel to another countrys now, I pay 30% more for goods than i did a few years ealier. Every penny of that 30% is going to pay for that mans debt! And what about these people that dont pay their credit cards and just go to bankruptcy? Why do we pay for these things? I think the US would be much better off financially if allowed indentured survitude and it would certainly make people make more of an effort to pay their bills. But what is the downside of not paying your bills in todays world? A few phone calls from a creditor who you dont know? ooooo...big punishment, so scary! What do you think?
If such a system was preferred, then the family - at least the children should be included. How can you remove the breadwinner from the household and leave the rest of the family to rot in the wind? Take the whole family! Actually, in Brazil there are roughly 500 000 slaves. They are lured onto transportation in promise of jobs, then they arrive to some desolate place with armed guards and huge bills for transportation and housing. They never did get to send those checks back home, and are trapped. There are slaves freed every month in Brazil There are also millions of domestic housekeepers - mostly young teens/children - who are kicked out of the household they are serving when they turn 18; without schooling, many times sexually abused (national sport to "fool around with the empregada" here) and without any means to support themselves. In the soap operas on TV here in Brazil, the former Italian colonial plantations and social life is portrayed and elevated as something chic - with the domestic help and slaves serving the "sophisticated, beautiful and rich".
You're paying more because the Federal Reserve cut rates to 0%. That 0% caused mal-investment - both private and Corporate - and created speculative bubbles. Should Citi-Bank, Bear Sterns, Lehman and Washington Mutual also be "indentured slaves" to their creditors? And in all cases, many of those "Creditors" are stockholders. How would that work?? It wouldn't. Individuals that walk-away from their mortgages suck. No agrument there. But again, how do you propose they pay it off? Become slaves to foreign banks who own a CDO thats title to their property? Logistically, its impossible. Second, there isn't a voter alive that wouldn't burn Washington if a President or Congress even tried to pass such law. Third, it fucks over well-intentioned people who get caught in the eventual gryations made by the FED. Fourth, there is a much easier, simple, amicable solution = make mortgage writers hold paper for a 5 year minimum before disposition. Then you wouldn't see predatory lending, bullshit rating or falsified loan apps. Everything would be above board. Theres a much larger problem than an idiot public who can't pay their mortgage. Its the Federal Reserve that creates such conditions to begin with - BUBBLES ALWAYS BURST.
I agree that the current crisis is due to a systemic failure caused by intervention. If you intervene on markets, you create an everlasting chain of imbalances which you will always need to react to.
I think you nailed it! If you think about it, there really is nowhere else to go. The model you describe is the perfect solution for anything from education to military drafts. Can't pay for your education? No problem, sign the dotted line below and give your soul over to XYZ corporation where you will serve for the next 10-15 years. This, of course, falls perfectly into line with the mingling of the private sector with academia which has strengthen in the past years.
Is it fair that we are born into perpetual debt bondage? Why dont we dig up the corpses of past generations and use them as slaves like in that "Fido" movie? How about only charging prorated income tax on the national debt on the portion that takes place during the years after 18. Corporations are individual entities. If we tax them on gross instead of net they go bankrupt. What do you think happens when we tax individuals this way? There should be a flat tax on everything after the costs of running yourself (as a business) right now the poor are taxed at a higher net income rate than the rich, people just fail to see this because taxes are paid on gross. (of course all taxes should be itemized as well so the government can't waste it, or at least so everyone knows that they are wasting it and where.) But I don't know if every individual running themselves as a business contitutes capitalism more than everyone buying and selling the time/life of others. 8s