Strategic Default and Slave Morality
July 10, 2010
Months ago an online dispute arouse between two people - slave masters and slave revolters. Though not a homeowner, I advocated strategic default - walking away from an below water mortgage that you can afford to pay. People like Megan McArdle (herself a welfare queen) argued in favor of slave masters: Pay your debts, plebeians! It's your duty.
What do the rich - the same people who work at banks and on Wall Street and who were themselves bailed out by Americans- do when living in an underwater home? They live as slave masters:
The housing bust that began among the working class in remote subdivisions and quickly progressed to the suburban middle class is striking the upper class in privileged enclaves like this one in Silicon Valley.
Whether it is their residence, a second home or a house bought as an investment, the rich have stopped paying the mortgage at a rate that greatly exceeds the rest of the population.
The rich have no morality:
The CoreLogic data suggest that the rich do not seem to have concerns about the civic good uppermost in their mind, especially when it comes to investment and second homes.
That is old news, to anyone who knows the rich. Yet the rich - through corporate-owned media organizations - nevertheless demand that the poor and middle class live by a separate set of rules. If you cannot understand that your entire moral system is based upon your enslavement, and was written by your oppressors, then you deserve your chains.