So anyway, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, I know you’ve been reading the blog with real intensity over the last few weeks. I know this because of the comments that you’ve been sending in via email. The inbox is filled with good stuff. Some of you told me that I’m mad. Some of you told me that I’m right. Some of you have told me that I’m wrong. Others have just said, “Get me off the list, G-d damn it!” Well, anyway, here’s my thoughts on how to solve this black hole of an economic crisis that has paralyzed the nation and the world.
The first thing I should tell you is that this solution is not my original thought; I want to tell you I heard it from a colleague who heard it from some radio personality who probably heard from his four-year-old kid in between watching episodes of “Wow Wow Wubbzy” and “Dora The Explorer”. But nonetheless it sounds good to me and after thinking about for a few days, running it by some people who are smarter then me and some who are not as smart as me, I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s the right thing to do. Again, like my other comments a couple of weeks back, it will cost the country absolutely nothing. We would not have to spend these 800 billion-odd dollars on something that we know will do absolutely nothing but expand the one thing we don’t need – both the federal and state bureaucracy.
Are you ready? Sit down and pay attention, because here’s the solution: a one year moratorium for all mortgage payers.
To be clear – every mortgage payer in America gets a one-year moratorium on payments. If you as of March 1, 2009, have 20 years left on your mortgage, you next payment is not due until March 1, 2010, and on that date you still have 20 years to maturity. Of course if you want to continue paying, you can as usual – good for you, by the way!
If you choose not to pay however, you can use the money for other bills, pay tuition, buy stuff, do what you want with it. Invest in the market or maybe use the money to get your teeth cleaned. It’s up to you. You have one full year to get your house (no pun intended) in order.
If you want to pay you can still pay; it’s fine – good for you! If you choose to pay for the next two months, let’s say to May, you still have the option of taking a year off. know it sounds crazy, but it’s got to be better then what we are currently planning on doing.
The banks will do better under this plan then operating as they are now, because there will be breathing room and everyone can work without pressure.
I believe this will stimulate the economy by doing something that will truly affect people’s lives, and, more important, will solve our problems while limiting the growth of the bureaucracy and wasting money, which is where we are going with this stimulus package that was passed last week.
The current thought process in Washington is quite scary to me, that the whole country, everybody I know, regardless of their economic status, is tightening their belts, and yet the government is expanding its expense side of the ledger. Their solution is to just keep spending, spending, spending with a little more spending. It makes no sense to me whatsoever that friends, family, and others are all operating in a better-safe-than-sorry mode and Congress and the President are acting like drunken sailors in Times Square for the first time.
We need to save ourselves from the government; we don’t need to be saved by the government. The people of America are resilient. We are able to downsize our spending not because the government tells us to but because we realize that we need to do it. These are desperate times, and desperate times call for desperate measures, but they don’t call for spending for spending’s sake. I know that the stimulus package has been passed and there is nothing I can do about it. That does not mean, however, that we should be silenced.
On the hedge fund front, I don’t really have any news to report except that I find the conversations I’m having with many managers to be extremely amusing. Everyone in the industry is saying that they can’t raise money, that there’s nobody willing to put money to work, blah, blah, blah. I’m sort of sick of hearing about it all day. I think the reality is if these managers started delivering on their promises of good, solid performance with steady returns that is uncorrelated to the market then they would have no problem raising money.
Maybe instead of blaming the market for their inability to raise money, they need to look inward and question the long-term viability of their offering. Hedge fund managers need to wake up and realize that the way to raise money is not by giving people a better deal on the fees or reducing lock-up periods. These things are not the problem, ladies and gentlemen; the problem is the managers themselves don’t know that they way to raise money is not by selling pie-in-the-sky performance but rather their ability to deliver on their promise of performance.
THINGS THAT DRIVE ME CRAZY
Once again I have come the conclusion that Comcast really does not want me as a customer. In the wake of last week’s fiasco, I was called by a “Customer Service Representative” to confirm the service was installed. My question was don’t you know that the service was installed. His response was that the company wanted to check. In my mind I thought, hmm, if I say no does that mean, I won’t get a bill next month? I asked again if he knew about the installation as I pondered saying no and his response was – “Look, can you please just tell me if the phone was installed and is working” I said no I can’t but thanks for calling and hung up. Am I wrong here or does it seem that this company is really screwed up in the customer service or lack of customer service department. Maybe they’re thinking “Customers? Ah, who needs ’em!”