I saw this on BoingBoing the other day, and thought it was interesting…
I just had a great hour-long phone conversation with an old friend, Will Dana (now editor of Rolling Stone), who has strongly encouraged me to come up with one-liners that tell the truth about the economic/banking fiasco – but that do it in almost zen-koan fashion. He thinks this might be the only way to penetrate ongoing confusion and resistance to moving beyond our falsely held assumptions about money and business.
So, I figured I’d start with the generally unrecognized fact that finance is America’s biggest industry – our biggest business sector. How does banking make its money? In short – over-simplified, yes, but ultimately true – interest. It sells debt. And, like I’m arguing in my book, this whole scheme was arranged by 14th Century monarchs as a way of making money by having money, rather than providing value. So “Debt is not a good product” helps encourage that line of thinking, sound-byte style.
I like this idea. Let’s apply it to real estate. Here are my entries:
- Your house is not an investment.
- Falling home prices are not abnormal.
- House debt is not wealth.
I’m sure some of the commenters here can do better. Let’s hear it.
[Update]
Great comments, everyone! My favorite one-liners from the comments (so far):
- If you can’t pay cash, you can’t afford it. – Scotsman @ 17
- Debt and interest steal choices from a future that is uncertain. – Scotsman @ 17
- A recession is a terrible thing to waste. – Greg Perry @ 25
- Declining home prices creates affordable housing. – Dave0 @ 32