I read that article too and came away with a lot of the same feelings. It's a pretty lousy thing to do to your teenagers to drag them away from their familiar friends, schools and neighborhoods and plop them down in such a god-forsaken place.
And anecdotally, this "just walk away" business seems to be overblown. The people interviewed in the article seemed to be doing everything they could to hold onto their houses, at extreme financial sacrifice.
Maricopa is just one of the many kinds of hell we seem to be able to build for ourselves.
Maricopa seems to be the home of people who are unable to manage relationships. There is nothing more pathetic than a divorced Dad in his 40's buying a stucco palace he can't afford to impress his teens. No material compensate a kid for his self centered parents getting a divorce!
For some reason, these teenagers don't seem sufficiently grateful to have been saved from the horrors of urban life--YMCAs, corner stores, malls, sidewalks, high schools--and plopped into a community with a big golf course, no business district, and no social activities that don't require a driver's license, a car, gas, and 45 minutes of travel time.
No golf course, but that sounds remarkably like the place where I live. The kids, however, seem to create their own entertainment... mail box bashing is a biggie this time of year. One they hit high school age, most of them get handed a pick up truck (tho not a new one). First thing they do is slap glass-packs on the exhaust.
I hate to get all nostalgic and everything, but I grew up in a small town that didn't have a mall until I was middle-school age, and as it was built on the edge near the highway it required driving (there was certainly no public transportation). It would have struck us as weird to hang out at a mall, anyway.
We rode our bikes everywhere. I remember us neighborhood kids having one glorious summer when a motel was being built near us. We played all evening in the construction site, where your basic low-equipment childhood games (hide & seek, various forms of fort-building) could flourish. It was, of course, "dangerous," and these days our parents would no doubt be sent to prison for allowing it. At least during the summer days we could ride our bikes to the library, the public pool, or a park.
In any case I refuse to believe this business about how all this suburban home-buying is "for raising kids." It seems to be for having them safe and sound until they hit puberty, and then making sure the little buggers find some way to raise themselves, either in the "media room" of the splendiferous house or at the supermarket. I have no particular objection to teenagers raising themselves in a lot of respects--Lord knows these hovering overprotective parents aren't doing them any favors--but they seem to be located in a place where the only way they can do so is to behave exactly the way their parents assumed they wouldn't: get a job at 16, eating into that precious "study time," just so they wouldn't go bonkers inside those big "family-friendly" houses.
Teenagers are supposed to be a nuisance; it's their job. What an odd world it is in Maricopa, where the kids do useful labor (bagging groceries) and the parents are all real estate brokers.
George C - Yeah, they all seemed to be running away from something. The impression I got was well-meaning people who just didn't seem to be able to cope with the world too well.
The guy who bought the house after his divorce "because he had watched his dad rent after his divorce and fritter his money away" - he's probably spent his whole life following his dad's footsteps - cigarettes, early, thoughtless marriage, divorce, moving around looking for something (even he's not sure what), then financial armaggedon. The rocker on the front porch of the roadside rest home is about all he really has to look forward to.
How come people look to others to organise a sence of community? Being independent asks for a responsibility to form the community yourself with the people present. This will also be a good lesson to teenagers, showing them an alternative to smashing mail-boxes.
I got the impression that there was no desire to live in Maricopa other than to buy a cheap, more affordable house. My guess is that most didn't buy to live there, but as a stepping stone to the huge mansion in Town.
(in my neck of the woods, Fry's isn't a supermarket, but a huge electronic and appliance store, like a Best Buy on steroids (thus the TV's, Video Games Etc...as if it matters)
he's probably spent his whole life following his dad's footsteps - cigarettes, early, thoughtless marriage, divorce, moving around looking for something
So, basically, he wasn't middle-class enough for a shot at the middle-class?
My response to the story was it sounded like the developers built for failure, abetted by a careless belief on everyone's part that local government is an unnecessary hindrance.
Yet we zero in on this guy's failed marriage, as if that's the real issue?
On the whole, I don't think anyone here is blaming the kids. The ones in Maricopa sound like a pretty good lot. It's the adults who seem to have some issues...
Fry's may be the big box electronics store. Its a cross between Best Buy & an old fashion electronic store where you buy parts to built/repair your own radio, robots, solar power station....
Maricopa is like the companies at the tail end of the Dotcom bubble...ie. companies not made to fill a demand for the products they sell, but made to be able to sell it's stock.
Maricopa was not built to supply the need to LIVE somewhere, but the need to OWN a home and make money. All the little details like, what are you and your kids gonna do while you wait for your house to earn your retirement, were beside the point.
Not really blaming the divorce, just saying that a lot of these problems seem to repeat generation to generation. And I agree that if we are allocating blame, the greatest part of it goes to the developers. But to me, there is a human interest story here. The developers can only make these kinds of messes if individuals have some kind of motivation to participate, and I'm trying to figure out the motivations.
I've been thinking about this for a while. Do we protect our children too much? I sometimes wonder if we're failing in our responsibility to "thin the heard" a bit. Perhaps our overprotection is allowing some of the weaker offspring to survive longer than they should. Take bicycle helmets. If a kid is too dumb to stay out of the street, putting a helmet on him just allows him to survive a battle of strength with a car, graduate to the next stage of life, and make other dumb choices that impact others, like planning a development without a high school.
To quote professor Linneman, "I'm only half-kidding."
What I guess I'm trying to say is that buying a house in this community was held out to people who are barely middle-class or struggling to enter it as a way to "raise your kids in the same safety and comfort" as the middle-class suburbanites do. These were, in the beginning, fairly modestly-priced suburban homes, and clearly the pitch was to "young families."
Yet all these folks found when they got there was suburban vacuity, in more ways than one.
Did I not make it clear enough for some people that "blaming the kids" was the furthest thing from my mind? I thought they were the most likeable people in the whole article. Precisely because they are trying to use the only real option the town gives them--working at the grocery part-time--to create some meaningful social space. They are refusing to stay isolated in the big media room and watch the big TV, and I think that's grand. Kudos to the proprietor of Fry's for not doing what so many suburban businesses in my neck of the woods do: practically declare war on teenagers because they don't want them "loitering" around and making the shoppers feel . . . threatened. Everybody came here to feel safe, you know. Better hide those sinister teenagers.
But they are having to fight against a community that was sold to their parents as "ready-made for raising kids." That's the part that is so mind-blowing.
Good Morning, Tanta. You're in fine fettle, I see.
one developer told her hed rather build a jail on his property than a high school
Defies rational commentary.
ended up with a fondue-fork wielding crowd after her for "child abuse."
Dee-licious!!!
We grew up in the same era, Tanta, although my setting was urban. Walked, bicycled, and stayed as far out of adult clutches as much as possible. (We played along the railroad tracks and under the bridges; specifically, on the catwalks.)
Youts of today would probably have a hard time believing that back-in-the-day any adult could haul off any kid anywhere any time for any reason to the nearest cop. That is, if the adult didn't actually slap you silly himself.
Voicing my objections to the status quo to my father (who was considerably more mild-mannered than the run of the mill,) he told me, "Little people are for big people to pick on. One day you'll be big people too."
What's bizarre about this story is that - where the kids are concerned - it recalls a 1970's movie called "Over the Edge," which was about the social lives of teens stuck in some godforsaken new exurban community somewhere in the New Mexico desert. For the kids, it's either hanging out at the local (underequipped) rec center, or going the vandalism, sex and drugs route. (One memorable scene had the hero and his girlfriend spending the night in a half-constructed house.)
Eventually, a group of these kids goes ballistic, manages to lock all the adults in the high school, and completely trashes the building (a sort of benign anticipation of Columbine, I guess).
I read this story and recalled the movie, and I couldn't believe that after 30 years this sort of adolescent hell is still playing out for some American kids.
I am shocked, shocked I tell you to discover that inattentive politicians, greedy developers and bureaucratic planners could collude to produce dysfunctional urban places.
The root of the word monotony is 'mono.' Maricopa is 92% SFRs and 96% white. Do you need any mayonaise with your cottage cheese, saltines and milk? Bad urban planning is not limited to inner city projects but at the same time don't whitewash exurbia because of these extreme examples.
They "pitched" these neighborhoods as places to raise kids because that is what the brochure should say to sell houses.
Many who bought there never envisioned actually having to stay their and "raise" their kids. If they cared about those things, it was likely as much for the resale value as anything. Like single people buying 3-4 bedroom homes because they had better resale. Nevermind that the home didn't fit their use needs, it fit their investment needs.
It's the same with any multi-level marketing. They hide themselves in businesses that actually sell products that people use, but you soon realize no one is doing the business of actually selling the products, they all are out trying to recuit people underneath them. The products are a front.
The "product" of a family friendly neighborhood was a front by the builders and buyers who felt it had to appear that way to be able to flip it on to the next level of poeple who presumably would buy because they actually wanted to live there.
One more thing about "Over the Edge" - it actually took a highly sympathetic view toward the kids, in a way that 1950's movies didn't. The last scene of the movie shows the hero on a bus going off to the reformatory. He looks out the window and sees his girlfriend and some of his buddies waving to him. The implication being, "We'll be here waiting for you when you get back." In other words, it was a celebration of the community that the kids had managed to eke out (even though the worst troublemaker of their group had been shot dead by the cops). There was really no sense that the adults in the film offered any hope or answers for the kids, and that there would be much meaningful change in the exurb.
The movie was so controversial that it was never shown theatrically and only turned up on HBO later. It was based on a real life event somewhere in California.
Oh and ONE MORE THING... when are people going to get it through their heads that desert communities cannot sustainably support large populations forever. Small populations maybe; large ones, no. What we're seeing here with these dying exurbs in the desert is exactly what today's archaeologists see when they study the Anasazi or the Chaco people. "Gosh, where did they all go so suddenly?" Poor planning isn't an exclusive feature of our own generation...
Really, anyone who buys an expensive house in the middle of the desert is pretty much stupid by definition to begin with.
Many who bought there never envisioned actually having to stay their and "raise" their kids. If they cared about those things, it was likely as much for the resale value as anything. Like single people buying 3-4 bedroom homes because they had better resale. Nevermind that the home didn't fit their use needs, it fit their investment needs.
I just don't get your mindset here.
Getting into the middle class is supposed to be about having both "the place to raise the kids" and a wealth-building asset. Jeebus, surely that's the point? Working-class people have always found perfectly acceptable shelter in which they could raise kids. But they weren't "owning" anything that would improve their kids' standard of living in the future.
I brought up the subway story because it seems so clear to me that there are powerful forces in this culture militating against people who choose to focus on "raising the kids" in an environment (NYC) in which homeownership is more an exception and public transportation the only practical option. In other words, in the world our media seems to live in, you simply can't do a good job raising kids without also buying into the buying into story.
Surely we could with little effort Google up some stories implying that people who focus only on their kids' childhood experiences, without "taking thought" for their retirement needs and the "wealth-building effects" of homeownership are "really" the bad parents.
I do find it odd that we want to assign everyone only one single motive or concern. Somehow I tend to think of people as rather more complex than that.
The Anasazi likely got wiped out with a triple threat. First a long drought, then a disease vector and then neighboring civilizations finished them off. They overdeveloped, over densified and pissed off the neighbors with those acts.
But they are having to fight against a community that was sold to their parents as "ready-made for raising kids." That's the part that is so mind-blowing.
Sigh. Deep sigh.
Why did the adults (with or without kids) buy there ? Economics was certainly part of the decision. I'm betting peer pressure had a bit to do with it as well ("my sister can afford a nice house, why can't we ?"). The list of possible reasons could go on and on. To ask someone who has a kindergarten age child (or children) to think that far ahead (call it 10 years ?) might be asking a bit much. At best, they would have been concerned about K-6 schools. Beyond that, they could up-flip to a neighborhood with better high schools.
Until now, where they are stuck (if lucky) or dealing with imminent FC.
School board needs to turn to the state (hat in hand) and ask for help (not that the state could do much these days).
I was born very near Maricopa, back in the 50s. Phoenix of my youth was largely a farm town. Now, it'll be the largest desert ghost town until Dubai runs out of petrodollars in 50 years.
I've always considered Phoenix 'Exhibit A' for naked capitalism... let developers do anything they want, and let's see what you get.
There used to be scores of orange groves, and Japanese flower farms down on Baseline Road, in far South Phoenix. Every one of them was razed for a 'Taco Moderne' stucco development.
Now I live in Oregon, and am thankful every day I can raise my kids here.
The Times is scared of bloggers Tanta. The real heart attacks are in the decimated city rooms and editorial boards. They should start blogs to give themselves an outlet. I feel better just imagining the comments section Gretchen would have.
Until kids are old enough to drive, it is the parents responsibility to "entertain" them.
Its just not the way it was when I was a kid anymore. Back then, we rode bikes miles away from home, built rafts on lakes, dug caves, did all kinds of fun dangerous things.
Today I wont let my kids leave the yard by themselves. So every weekend is spent on kids activities, sports, etc. Thats just the way it has to be now. Theres always plenty to do, but it costs time and money. A lot of money. But the kids are the most important thing.
I'm betting peer pressure had a bit to do with it as well ("my sister can afford a nice house, why can't we ?").
I still think we're missing a whole other kind of "peer pressure." Namely: It is an unassailable truth of the universe that the best place to raise kids is in a "nice house." My sister "provided for" her kids. I should therefore "provide for" my kids, or else I'm a bad parent. I shouldn't leave them where they are, because they'll get in trouble hanging out at the Y or walking to the store. Every time I pick up a newspaper or flip on the TV I see wall-to-wall coverage of missing kids and the horrors of Drugs and so on.
You are telling me this wasn't/isn't a profoundly common way to think?
Of course the people who bought in Maricopa figured a high school would be built when needed. I doubt many people these days have a lot of prior experience with ungoverned localities with absolutely no planning and no process for citizens to set priorities. And the RE community did exactly nothing to help them understand the risks of that.
There really IS a food chain by that name. ( OT, and btw, the Fry's Electronics in Phoenix unfortunately did NOT live up to its well deserved reputation for appalling service but did still have the huge range of geeky stuff at great prices when I shopped there in Oct 2006 ).
I found this in the article scary and amusing too:
He took a shine to a planned community called Anthem, about 30 miles north of Phoenix,...Fox found he was able to get more house for less money in Maricopa.."
He LIKED Anthem ? And regards Maricopa as more downmarket than that ? Sheesh. I made a point of driving around Anthem for 30 minutes on my out to Prescott ( yeah, I know what that implies classwise ) - it was gawdawful. Dread to think what Maricopa is like - but the writer has painted a great portrait.
Also, this struck me:
...and Fox put 15 percent down, his life savings. From Chase Bank, he got a so-called 2/28 adjustable-rate mortgage, which meant that for the first two years he would pay 7.5 percent interest..
With 15% down he ought to have got a much better deal surely ? Did he get put into a subprime unnecessarily by some swindling shit ?
Great article - I'll have to visit that Fry's next time I'm going down that way towards Tombstone..
I doubt many people these days have a lot of prior experience with ungoverned localities with absolutely no planning and no process for citizens to set priorities. And the RE community did exactly nothing to help them understand the risks of that.
Tanta, to a large degree you have this backwards. Maricopa is the product of too much planning and not enough organic growth. Use google maps and look at the patterns. Then zoom in at look at the waste of space for the function(s) anticipated. These are recent communities. If anything they suffer under the yoke of overheavy planning.
Thanks for memory lane, Justin... that's what MOST of the Phoenix area looks like, now. The wealthier middle class areas have slightly nicer malls, slightly more natural landscaping. You can tell when you're in a nicer area.. the mall parking lots don't have oil stains in the parking spaces, and there aren't check cashers.
But they all have the same horrific blandness about them... tan stucco, surface streets larger than most state highways... it's the suburban nightmare Jim Kunstler writes about all the time in his 'clusterF@ck nation' blog, every monday.
God, I'm so glad I'm here in Oregon, skirting a heart attack, blogging, instead.
Today I wont let my kids leave the yard by themselves.
You must be like a lot of my neighbors. I live in a very kid-friendly neighborhood--even the apartments in my complex are at least two and mostly three bedroom, designed for families. Sidewalks on both sides, a park, play areas.
And yet, on the weekends and the early evenings, I have the whole place to myself. Except for one elderly man who lives a few blocks down and a couple of dog-walkers, I toddle along on my walks on vast vistas of uninhabited sidewalks. What, exactly, is the "threat" these kids have been permanently grounded to protect them from? Me?
Good lord, even back when I weighed 100 pounds soaking wet and leaned on a cane for my walks, I never felt threatened on the half-mile trip down to the corner store. (Actually, I'd put up with at least one and sometimes two cars pulling over, their anxious drivers asking if I needed a ride.)
So the dogs can't run loose because they might bite the kids who can't run loose, and all of this is because there's some threat lurking here that I, a single woman living alone who is actually more than typically observant, can't discern.
In rural Nebraska, we had to cut holes in our pockets to find something to play with.
I turned out OK, but I do buy my slacks with the long, loose pockets now.
The one thing missing in the article is what this guy was making. $212M house w/ 15% down is probably better than the vast majority of purchases in the last three years. If a common worker cannot afford a $200M mortgage, how are we going to reduce inventory of homes, raise interest rates to sensible levels, etc.?
What, exactly, is the "threat" these kids have been permanently grounded to protect them from?
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/cvus9903.pdf
Table 52. Personal crimes, 1999:
Victimization rates for persons age 12 and over,
by type of crime and locality of residence of victims
Rates per 1,000 persons age 12 and over
Type of crime areas Urban Suburban Rural
Personal Crimes 41.5 33.7 25.1
Crimes of violence 39.8 32.8 24.9
The "Urban" and "Suburban" totals are further broken down based on
urban area size because the UCR conclusions as to the causes of crime was
not simple density but "population density and degree of
urbanization." The reason for this was
because there is no effective way to establish the independence of the
two variables based on the data being measured.
Personal anecdote, couldn't help myself: I grew up in Manhattan riding buses by myself from the age of 6 (it was 1963). Once I did get my hair pulled by some kids, but mostly I was fussed over by old ladies. I was terrified of the subway until I was grown.
One of my brothers is raising his kids in the suburbs of a big middle-America city where you can't walk anywhere which I find horrifying, but the kids are pretty much the only interesting people around.
Rob, I think of "planning" as more than subdivision street layout.
There is no "overheavy planning" in a community that fears building a new high school in case it lowers property values, or has only one route to the nearest job center that is crossed by a freight railroad line with no overpass. Did you catch that part? All those commuters on the only highway access to their jobs, sitting at a crossing waiting for some creeping freight train to pass 60 times a day?
Namely: It is an unassailable truth of the universe that the best place to raise kids is in a "nice house."
errr... I disagree. The best way to raise kids is to pay attention and to raise kids. The welfare of the kids should come first, and the bling-value of the house or neighborhood should follow. This could easily deteriorate into a good-neighborhood/bad-neighborhood discussion tho. What I was trying to get my thoughts around, was the concept of materialism as a key objective. IOW, people who bought homes on the concept of 'niceeeee' instead of "what are amenities and support structure of the neighborhood".
I know many people (some of my neighbors even) who are raising kids quite well, while living in single-wide or double-wide MH's. They live in rural settings on larger tracts of acreage. The kids get on the school bus every morning and return home the same way in the afternoon. When the kids become teens, they'll ride a different bus to a different school.
This is a difficult concept to verbalize (in print no less), but the parenting skills should come first. Just because you live in a 'nice house' does not automatically make you the 'best parent' possible.
A number of members [Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates] of the Gulf Cooperation Council aim to introduce a single currency by 2010.
Rob, I'm getting to the point of having little use for "crime" statistics like that, since I'm getting to the point of wondering what some of these "crimes" were.
Having your hair pulled by a bunch of little berks on the bus? These days, that's felonious assault.
In a "zero tolerance" environment, there's precious little a lot of kids can do that isn't a "crime." Apparently there are people who think the subway mom is a "criminal," and her kid is the victim of a "crime."
So don't toss these statistics at me, please. I begin to be a bit suspicious of them.
The worst part is some clown probably got a government grant to do the study.
OK, I take it back. This gig may yet give me heart failure.
What "study?" You didn't read the article, or your ideology (government only wastes money with stupid grants) gets in the way of basic reading comprehension.
There is no "study." It's some reporter taking a couple of unrelated facts--people who were bloggers actually died from a disease that has a huge hereditary component--and turned it into a "trend." Or a possible trend we should be afraid of. It wasn't funded by the government, it was "funded" by the famous free market infotainment industry.
This is actually quite amusing as a comment on a thread about how the utter lack of a local government seems to have doomed a boom-town to failure.
You can move as far from the evil city as you want, but the fear will always follows as long as the media is programming you.
I knew a woman in San Jose whose fiv- and seven-year old children were not allowed to leave the yard without an adult. She lived in fear. In the safest neighborhood of about the safest big city in America.
On the other hand, I saw my friends' kids grow up in San Francisco with unlimited cheap access to the transit system -- which even could take them out of town -- and the result was a class of kids who knew how to handle themselves, by themselves, in any situation, by the time they were 14.
Moving out to the boonies here in Northern Cal is almost never to the benefit of the kids; it's for property appreciation. If the parents had the money, they'd stay close in and buy in a city with a stellar public school system like Palo Alto or Cupertino or good charter schools. Believe me, moving to a stark subdivision on the edge of the fields in Tracy -- or Maricopa -- is good for no one's children.
There is no "overheavy planning" in a community that fears building a new high school in case it lowers property values,
It was the developers that feared their property values would be decreased by providing for a high school and they are correct. It is only because of bad planning and a school board that can't say no that there is a problem. All the school board has to do is present a letter to the council stating they will no longer issue will serve letters until there is a secondary school plan in place. The claim that the superintendant has to beg is ludicrious. Same for any poormouth from the fire department, et al.
As to crime, the FBI since 1929 has identified density and degree of urbanization as the number one indicator of general and violent crime rates. I'm sorry you are tired of hearing it but there is no reason to be suspicious as to the veracity.
What is missing from the article is why can't this guy afford the house. He took a $212K mortgage which was fine when prices were going up. It does not say he lost his job or became disabled. So why does he face FC?
They also didn't have a mayor, a city council, planning department... actually, the first city employee hired was the City Manager, I think. I read that in the Arizona Republic a few years ago, since Maricopa did not and still does not have a local newspaper.
Check out their official website.. kind of interesting... they also had vandalism at their local city park, that shut off the water fountains. They recommend that people 'bring their own water' to the park. In a desert. It's that kind of hell hole. 401 Authorization Required
By the way, I believe the FBI statistic.. but it's basically saying (my guess), that where there are more people, there are more crimes.
From the article:
In 2005, the local school district appointed a superintendent, John Flores, who began pleading with the developers for space for a high school (for a while, Maricopa schools were admitting 300 new students every month). But it was to no avail. Amy Haberbosch, Maricopas former director of planning, told me that developers believed high schools lowered property values;
They had a board and a superintendent neither of whom had the huevos to say no to developers thus shortchanging the children with bad planning. So, yes I read the article. If you want to go back further then the board of supervisors acting in those functions were also guilty.
"They had a board and a superintendent neither of whom had the huevos to say no to developers thus shortchanging the children with bad planning. So, yes I read the article. If you want to go back further then the board of supervisors acting in those functions were also guilty."
There's a lot to a situation like this. Sure, the board of supervisors is responsible. And...who helped them get elected? Did they get big money from the developers? Did it become clear locally that you couldn't get elected without developer money?
It's easy to blame individuals; but if one doesn't think that pouring huge money into a political system can't warp the outcome against the best interests of the community, one hasn't been reading the papers.
I don't know that this happened. But that's what I've seen happen with other communities that took on too much development. Take a small, poor community, tell the landowners they'll get rich, get the right people elected, and then build a hellhole of a community that can't sustain itself. And run off with your money.
Construction sites! Such blissful childhood memories go back to the years when the interstate widened from four lanes to twelve. First, they vacate the houses and you can break in and hide in them and wreck them. Then they bulldoze the houses and you can play postattack thermonuclear warzone games. You can play on the construction equipment too, of course. Then they cart away the rubble and bulldoze all the trees and you can play Tarzan - you'd be amazed how much acreage you can coverage with the flattened foliage of a few dozen trees. Then they strip the land and grade the roadbed, creating giant cliffs and dirt bombs which make awesome clouds of dust around your target's head. I wish the kids in these brand-new slums a wonderful childhood like that.
Come on, Rob. Even if you don't read the whole thing, I did quote these clues:
But at the beginning of Maricopas growth, the city was unincorporated, and all these negotiations were made by a three-person county board of supervisors that was working from rural zoning codes dating back to 1962.
By the time Maricopa became a city, though, almost half of its land was owned by developers.
Maricopa did not incorporate as a city until 2005. When it finally got a school superintendent. After the developers were already fully in control of almost half the real estate in the city.
Tanta - you reminded me of my youth during the summer. Riding our bikes from sun up to sun down(until the street lights came on). Or playing basketball or having dirt-clod wars. Almost no tee-vee was, as we didnt have cable
Ownership of real estate does not vest with development rights. It was the electeds and staff that screwed up the urban planning aspects that led to the magnitude of this disaster. Other boomburgs incorporated around the same time with similar circumstances with vastly different outcomes.
"IN THE EARLY 1990S, Maricopa was a small farming community with a population of about 600, mostly longtime farmers and Hispanic laborers, along with a few American Indians"
This is one of the last holdouts of the Monroe Doctrine. I knew we could find and ruin every last place on this continent.
He took a $212K mortgage which was fine when prices were going up. It does not say he lost his job or became disabled. So why does he face FC?
Because since he bought that house, he remarried, which people have been known to do since the time of Henry VIII, and he and his wife don't need two houses. Plus that teaser-rate went away, which isn't helping any.
We need to stop ignoring the "immobility" problem. The people who really get stuck when they're underwater are those who have some good reason--marriage, jobs, family needs--to move, but now can't. The whole RE industrial complex spent a lot of the last several years nattering on about "putting down roots," but never mentioned the risk that you can't move when you need to.
For once, we get a story in the bleedin' NYT that isn't about a single individual with a "sympathy story," and we can't focus on the larger picture drawn. We can only keep going back, obsessively, to individuals and the "financial mismanagement" or even--help me, Rhonda--picking apart their marriages or divorces or fucking smoking looking for some "original sin" in these individuals that can "explain" the whole sorry mess.
The reason we'll never get a useful proposal for ways to mitigate the pain of a bust is that too many people are too invested in their own self-satisfaction and can't stop themselves from wondering what these people did to bring it all on themselves. We will make no progress until people examine that impulse.
Getting into the middle class is supposed to be about having both "the place to raise the kids" and a wealth-building asset. Jeebus, surely that's the point?"
And then went on to say how I somehow ascribe a common motive to all buyers and that you see people as more complex. Yet you seem to know what everyone's "point" is, or their desire.
The fact is they bought here as an investment they also had to live in. And builders built here simply to sell houses, not because a community was needed. It didn't spring out of a growing demand but was placed there, a ready made community, like a movie set in Hollywood.
I dare say everyone robs a bank for the same motive, no matter the complexities of the individual. Sometimes you can ascribe common motives. In this case it's safe to say that the majority of people buying here did not have a desire to live out a peaceful life in Maricopa. They bought here to get on the property ladder so the house could save the downpayment for the house they REALLY wanted in the neighborhood they really wanted for the price they couldn't afford right now.
It was a gold rush. Their motives were as similar as the 49er's, to strike it rich. Yes people are complex. But when complex people all get the same idea at the same time you get what's called a "bubble".
The whole RE industrial complex spent a lot of the last several years nattering on about "putting down roots," but never mentioned the risk that you can't move when you need to.
Certainly this is another emerging theme of this crisis as those tender roots have become hard and fast anchors.
In this case it's safe to say that the majority of people buying here did not have a desire to live out a peaceful life in Maricopa.
The relitter and her buddies interviewed in the beginning of the article seem to have had no desire to stay in Maricopa.
But what makes you think that Adrianna's and Alajeda's parents thought that way?
I am merely making the point that people can want a lot of things at once, and can choose strategies that they think or hope will meet all their needs. I don't think you have to search to find their one and only one "real" motive.
Robbing banks is certainly an interesting comparison. That tends to be a behavior of those whose complex strategies have all failed, and who then drive themselves or are driven to a stunningly uncomplex strategy that almost never works.
We did not just spend the last five to ten years being deluged by media and "financial advisers" and advertisers and politicians of the "ownership society" sort encouraging us to think of buying homes as a single-motivation activity of the desperate. We were "sold" on it by people trying to tell us it would meet all our needs.
If we're going to go back and retroactively lump everyone who bought into that as a "criminal," then count me the hell out.
I think Maricopa should hire Jim Kunstler to be their new director of planning. He is bright and easy going and probably could help them more quickly move to their end game.
So, The New York Times sends another pith-helmeted writer out into the heart of flyover country to investigate the culture and lifestyle of what they regard as primitive inhabitants. Of course, the reporter finds ennui here. It's boring compared to Manhattan.
You should volunteer for a police ride along sometime. The children this society is creating will really stand your hair on end. Businesses don't want kids around, and people don't want to live next to high schools, not because of the movies they see, but because of what these kids actually do. It doesn't grow out of some urban legend grounded in baseless fear. It grows out of rational self-preservation based upon real life events that happen to them.
Tanta - you reminded me of my youth during the summer. Riding our bikes from sun up to sun down(until the street lights came on). Or playing basketball or having dirt-clod wars. Almost no tee-vee was, as we didnt have cable
In my case it was often the little girl with glasses leaving the library and searching for a secluded spot to open her books, free from both the teevee noise and those rotten boys with their dirt-clod wars. We didn't always just look for ways to be with other kids in a social environment; at least some of us were looking for a way to get away from those "organized" and "structured" and adult-managed "activities" that can sap a poor kid's abilities to use her own imagination, thanks, instead of some adult's.
My sister was more into the basketball and dirt-clod thing.
...at least some of us were looking for a way to get away from those "organized" and "structured" and adult-managed "activities" that can sap a poor kid's abilities to use her own imagination, thanks, instead of some adult's.
Kids are geniuses at adaptive reuse, at least when given the tools.
You should volunteer for a police ride along sometime.
No, I'll stay home and blog where I can develop heart disease.
Oh well. It's good to finally find out what my neighbors are hiding their children inside their homes from: their children.
They have to be someone's children, these knife-wielding maniacs? Don't they? How can not living near a high school protect you from . . . your children? Don't they eventually have to come home for dinner and a place to sleep?
I was amused by the fact that one of the kids told her it was boring compared to Illinois. Which is rather closer to what I think of as "flyover" country.
Wow.
My fondest memories as a kid were of wondering around, miles away from any adults, in fields and piles of dirt, throwing rocks and trying to catch snakes and jumping in puddles....
But my own 5yr old daughter, I won't let into the front yard unsupervised.
I'd like to let her run around the neighborhood, ring the other kids doorbells by herself (like I did), but I'm afraid I'll get arrested for child abuse/neglect.
"If we're going to go back and retroactively lump everyone who bought into that as a "criminal,"
Perhaps we are talking past each other.
I don't hear people claiming that the buyers were criminals, only that they, like those that enroll in MLM schemes, were one part of a two part scheme to make money and essentially forgot what the purpose was of buying a house and living in a community.
The Builders and buyers both wanted to set up a community of homes, not for the purpose of providing a place for people to actually live, but only as a vehicle for which to buy and sell houses like stocks of a dotcom company. The company is set up only so far as to appear to be a legit company based upon some legit business need, but then when you get down to the nitty gritty you realize all the true effort and design in making the company was only so that it would make the stock more desireable...if you talked to the founders you'd realize that all that was on their mind was to go public, running the actual business was a side-issue. And all the stock buyers bought not to own a piece of a good business but to buy a rising asset and sell it to someone else later. That is what Maricop was. A shell of a community built and bought soley as a means to an end...to make money.
I am not sure this makes anyone a criminal...it just means alot of people who had the same motive..to make money...all decides simultaneously that buying and selling houses was the best way to do it.
Limiting the damages of this is simply to stop the bubble in the first place, if possible.
Your call to arms to prevent the damage from a damage causing event reminds me of some of Vince Lombardi's old sayings...such as
"That place...nobody goes to that place anymore, it's too crowded".
Or, my own...."let's say we vandalize this place...but do it without causing damage."
Tanta,
The thread comments about overprotective parents is funny. We here in Palo Alto have an active wildlife. Last year a mountain lion was shot a mile from our house. The damn critters come down from the mountains looking for a quick snack and some cop kills them. This does make the local moms and dads a bit nervous. Not as nervous as the moms and dads in Los Altos Hills, Atherton or Woodside where they don't let their kids play in the backyard.
I took Google Earth Airlines down to Maricopa while reading this and looked around. Why in the hell did they build at that density when land prices had to be so cheap. This is old Arizona ag country. I flew about looking at the fields and orchards surounding Maricopa and saw old Arizona - big yards, no grass, lawn cars and lots of junk. Old Arizona is my kind of place.
I was born & raised in Tucson -- a child of the '50s. The desert where I used to ride my horse, play cowboy & Indian and build forts has been transformed into Taco-tacky Moderne big box stores, strip malls, medical centers, homes & townhouses, fancy gated communities, golf courses, etc. As a young adult, I lived & worked in Scottsdale/Phoenix.
Arizona sold its soul to the developer. Why am I not surprised my family & others now live in a developers' hell?
Kunstler is holding his powder dry. He'd like to go off one one of his snark attacks but for the uncomfortable issue that the cenurbs are seeing the same implosions. Wanna buy a downtown condo to lose weight, save money and the planet? Thought not.
Kinda late to the party here, but have to comment on the kid's parenting stuff. Have 4 at home in an "exploding" small town in Central Tx. Our kids and the neighbors play outside and would be in the street more if my wife wasn't a "scaredy cat". Upthread many remark on how the kiddos need to learn on their own and by god, the problem with many parents and the nanny ( read a rant coming here, breathe!!) they won't until they get knocked down (not necessarily by a car) and get back up, over and over again.
Let them live or watch them struggle later OH yeah, watch it now!
As someone who finds the suburban lifestyle anathema (I don't even have a drivers license), I can at least understand the parents impulse.
In my 20s I lived in places that were interesting, but questionable. When D.C. was the murder capital of the U.S., I lived in its zip code with the highest murder rate. There are times, like when there are a couple flipped over police cars burning within a couple blocks of your home, that you lose a fundamental sense of security.
I remember once when there was a random killer about, someone had been shotgunned in an alley a block up from ours. It was like 9pm on a summer night, just after dusk, and I got up to go mail a letter in the box on the corner and my (now) wife looked at me like I was insane and refused to let me leave the apartment.
I was young with no possessions. It would obviously be a lot different at 35, and with kids.
I think I know why kids find life "boring". They live in such a sterile environment today. I had a great childhood "rich" in play & colorful in experiences.
While were on the subject of Arizona. I have a question. I remember a few years ago, there was one of those perennial stories about water shortages in the west and it I seem to remember that Phoenix got most of their water from the ground and was draining the aquifer at some alarming rate.
Since then, their population has probably increased 30% and you don't hear anything about the water situation.
Bob_in_MA
They built the canal down from the Colorado River some years ago. The interesting part of that is how, because they are using all of their water alotment, Southern California can't use it.
I tend to think that those who have fond memories of a carefree, worryfree childhood are naturally the ones who survived unscathed. I too remember leaving the house in the morning and being gone till dusk...all as a 2 or 3 grader.
Now with TV, internet etc, we all get to share in the terror experienced by the few.
It's kinda like the antelope in the field blissfully eating away as the lions pace back and forth taking off the weakest. It's only hell for those who don't live to tell about it.
Now we all get to enjoy everyone else's hell and we start seeing the lions pacing back and forth, and even though the odds of getting eaten are the same...low....we nevertheless don't get to enjoy the bliss that ignorance once allowed.
This is the type of housing infrastructure worth investing in.
Wouldn't touch AZ unless your community has a long-term water conservation plan and is as sustainable as possible. I regret to say I see some very interesting times ahead for these families, when water starts drying up and gas prices make the shipped-in goods they depend on prohibitively expensive.
When I was a kid (60's) my mother was one of the few that worked in the neighborhood. All the fathers worked. I went home after school (to an unlocked house, I believe) but it was understood that I could call on Mrs D one house down, and Mrs H, two houses up, in an emergency. I think the only time I ever did was when there was an enormous bug in the living room, and Mr H came to my rescue. I got teased about that a lot.
I wasn't responsible for my four years younger sister until I was 12: she stayed with Mrs. H after school. My main form of entertainment those days was reading, so my parents no doubt figured I wouldn't get into too much trouble.
It was a different world. Many neighborhoods now seem to have no adults around during the working day.
Maricopa seems to be the home of people who are unable to manage relationships. There is nothing more pathetic than a divorced Dad in his 40's buying a stucco palace he can't afford to impress his teens. No material compensate a kid for his self centered parents getting a divorce!
George C | Homepage | 04.06.08 - 8:31 am | #
George, as a Divorced Dad, all I can say is: GO FUCK YOURSELF.
The Phoenix area gets most of its water from the Salt River.... many of the small towns (Scottsdale, Guadalupe, etc.) were actually started as 'water user's villages.. housing for farm help.
Groundwater withdrawal is a fairly common supplement or sole source for towns outside the Salt River Project service area. On the edges of the cities, groundwater withdrawal has caused subsidence.. sinking.
Bringing water from the Colorado to the Phoenix area requires huge amounts of electricity for pumping water uphill out of the Colorado, and I think two other uphill runs before Phoenix.
Whenever water conservation measures have been brought up for local votes, they have been rather soundly defeated. This causes long time native s like my mother to say, "What are those people thinking?"
Water flows uphill, toward money and power.
Dawgs have territories to defend, and the pinnacle of human achievement that is exurbia is one of them.
Even when an exurban community is described in hellish terms (facts apparently not really in dispute), a dawg finds something to wag - an unincorporated region was subjected to heavy handed 'urban planning,' thus spoiling everything that is good and pure about exurbia. Except the 45 minute drive - at least they managed to keep that delightful facet of exurbia intact.
Because, truly, only human imperfections can mar the utopia that is exurbia. In the one true and real exurban nation, everything is as perfect as the mind can make it - where all that works is due to a lack of planning, and whatever doesn't work is directly traceable to the evil that is urban planning.
And some people wonder why those living in California have such a hard time with reality. Must be because of all that urban planning getting into the water supply, or something.
But I can hardly wait for more explanation of how a dawg can say that such a fittingly described example of exurbia constructed over the last several decades is not a perfect example of exurbia, but something entirely different.
Maybe if Maricopa would just start building nuclear reactors instead of schools, they could all drive electric cars, because no one ever wants to live in walking distance of anything, anyways.
And I wonder - would a dawg let a child actually get on a subway, alone, to get somewhere in a city, especially because the FBI has certified how dangerous all those urban spaces are? I mean, the child might start getting all sorts of crazy ideas, like how the subway is a fine way to get around one of the world's greatest cities, or even that maybe, the city isn't any more dangerous for children today than it was in the lives of children over many decades (except for the cars, but hey - if there wasn't any planning, even cars wouldn't be a problem). Those who would really want to live there must be deluded, simply neglecting the beckoning charms of the exurban nation that is Maricopa - which could only be improved at this point by getting rid of any urban planning regulations currently on its books.
Some people think a dawg's life is miserable - not me. I think it must be full of things that most of the rest us cannot recognize in our daily lives, being blinded by reality as we are.
Like those homesick kids, who obviously don't know that where they lived before does not meet a dawg's exacting standards of a suitable place to grow up in. Because kids are much easier to ignore than a mature, responsible, respectable, and infallible dawg.
I tend to think that those who have fond memories of a carefree, worryfree childhood
Speaking only for myself, I don't recall childhood being either carefree or worry-free.
Of course we knew there were threats. We were, um, out there in the world to see them. I don't remember mountain lions--wrong part of the country--but we had coyotes, skunks, and the odd feral cat. Plus, of course, there were no leash laws in those days. You saw kids out on bikes get hit by cars. There was the "dirty old man" down the next block you were warned to stay away from.
I hardly think it was all romantic playtime without a care in the world. I worry about parents who want their kids to grow up "carefree" and "worry free," because the world isn't that kind of a place, and also because that's just ignoring the different anxieties inculcated in the current generation, who now have "leaving the yard" as a terror instead of "getting run over by a car," which they can undoubtedly not imagine, having never been out on a bike.
Nor am I foolish enough to think that letting one's kids run wild is particularly wise. I have no idea why these things always come down to apparently binary, black and white choices. That I blame on teevee.
The very reason I started with the observation that I hate to be nostalgic is, precisely, this. One cannot evoke anything one did happen to like about one's childhood without, it seems, falling into or being pushed into the rhetorical trap of "those happy golden years." Bleh.
Rob, you are a libertarian fool (as if there were any other kind of libertarian) if you think "overheavy planning" and "no high school" are somehow compatible concepts.
The definition of a "nice house" has certainly changed over the years! Our house was clean and "nice" by 1950s-1960s standards, but today? Still nice, but probably not desired by today's parents. The bathroom was smaller than today's closets and the "media room" was a small black-and-white TV in the corner of the living room. When transistor radios appeared, teenagers thought they had died and gone to heaven. Top 40 all day, every day!
Well, what can I say? I happen to love these nostalgic observations (perhaps not a steady diet of them, however). So much happier than thinking about the coming meltdown and end-of-empire era, which I do think is long overdue. I'll think about that tomorrow, unless we're all gone with the wind by then.
I hope some of our stories will linger in the historical memory, along with the torture and war and criminal behavior. But, I wonder.
I think parents are putting children and teens too much in the mindset that "someone should provide you with something to do." Important life lesson: there are always plenty of fun things to do. Think 'em up.
Those teens who don't learn this lesson end up ferrying their own children back and forth to lessons and athletic practices the rest of their lives. Rather them than me!
"Libertarian fool" is redundant, since by definition, a Libertarian is someone who believes in personal responsability, and we all know what a foolish idea that is.
Uh, nanny "state"
I'm a pretty conservative guy, which is why I moved back to Tx, although I have been working in a housing job with high federal and state subsidies.
Our government is, surprise to y'all here, dysfunctional in thought and action, so must those of us who vote be also because we keep returning the same folks over and over again.
Government has a heavy hand and by virtue of the approx 30% of economic activity which it wields, has entered the tent. Who among us here spend a significant amount of their time dealing with regulations? Who actually read these CFR and agency regualtions to see how pervasive the bureaucrats have become in how we live. Look at the idiots in CA wanting to ban smoking inside your apartment or all the other idiotic things going on while the deficit is approx $14B.
Pls don't get me wrong, the markets need regulation. Government has a role but it is fast moving from a benevolent force to a malignant dictator of social and economic mores. In CA, the lawyers go aroung finding places without correct signage and suing with the idea they can settle because the cost of defending yourself is so high as to be injustice.
Before I leave you each to your own experience so we can move on, it is taking a thought and moving to action against those powers that steal our personal freedoms every single day that will make the difference. BTW, I do not smoke but I will not be silent when others come for those that do.
I think a remember reading a post that suggests that this housing problem is impeding (physical) mobility in the US. Although this might make for a less efficient economy, I'm sure that many kids won't complain, and they'll be able to build relationships with their peers that are just a bit stronger than the ones that X-ers were able to build and that Boomers might have taken for granted.
Agreed, Baron... that regulation and enforcement is usually supplied by a government.
By the way.. about the water supply in Arizona? Like I said earlier in the thread... most water comes from the Salt River system... the most expensive water comes from the Colorado River... that's because it required billions of dollars to build and run the canals and pumping plants (I counted 15 plants on the CAP map). Since this was mostly federal dollars, we've all had a share of paying for the suburban mess in Arizona. 401 Authorization Required
Of course, the Colorado is not running like it used to, and every kind of energy is getting more and more expensive...
Again, Jim Kunstler is a bit nuts... but it's difficult to exaggerate the problems Arizona has created for itself.
I live in a subdivision built in 1960. There are NO sidewalks. It also happens to be in the best school district in the state, although our neighborhood is modest. Kids still play ball in the street, with spotters, although the neighborhood "leaders" tried to set up a homeowner's association last year which would have made this forbidden. Luckily they failed. I let my kids go out, but with some caveats - don't bike on the bike path (too isolated) - go on the street, which sounds scarier, but isn't. Funny thing is, my younger daughter (13) won't go out - too scared. Of course, she's also afraid of thunderstorms. I think it's her.
I can't imagine what these parents would think of Berlin - children as young as seven get on their bikes and ride to school alone.
Also reminds me of the case in NY where a Danish woman left her infant outside on the sidewalk for some fresh air in February while she sat 3 feet away in the window (child was all bundled up - and assuredly sleeping like a log based on my experience). She was arrested and had the child stripped away until the embassy intervened. NYers thought is was doubly criminal - it's cold and there are child snatchers out there! - Danes could not even comprehend the fuss. Very amusing case of cross-cultural confusion.
I believe that statistic imply that your child is safer with strangers than a trusted relative as far as abuse!
Children who grow up in secluded developments are lucky to escape the "The Lord of the Flies " syndrome.
Average Joe- in this case I think you're extrapolating too much from the extreme cases. The case of violent teenagers is happening anyway, even with our precautions. What is the danger on the other side? Mal-adapted socially inept kids?
BTW- I believe that's Fry's was founded in Texas and two brothers took the name in separate direction's (the stores have the same Logo face).
I don't hear people claiming that the buyers were criminals, only that they, like those that enroll in MLM schemes, were one part of a two part scheme to make money and essentially forgot what the purpose was of buying a house and living in a community.
This is a great thread actually. I think most are missing the point of what Tanta is saying. It is not about any individual's motives, it is about our culture. We need to examine our CULTURE!
Buying a house is what Americans are supposed to DO! We believe an education leads to more opportunity. We believe hard work eventually pays off. We BELIEVE, always and everytime, that property ownership is the smart thing to do to live a prosperous life.
No matter what! This is so integrated in our culture we don't really notice. The fish not noticing the water.
I have watched several smart professional friends, not greedy, impale themselves by buying even when they knew that they might have to move in a couple of years. When I gently probe, it is clear that that is just what you are supposed to do. It is ASSUMED to be the right decision! Their parents say so, our leaders say so ("ownership society"), their friends say so, their financial advisors say so! For the love of god, people are trying desperately and ignorantly to try and make it!
Our kids are inundated by sophisticated and intentionally designed advertising for bad food while simultaneously a culture of fear keeps them inside and we wonder why they are fat! Parents themselves are increasingly ignorant and confused about cooking and food. We have to have experts tell us how to eat. Listen to your grandmother!
We WORSHIP unquestioningly free market ideology and the flexibility of the work force and wonder why communities are not as cohesive! No @#$&, if we move every 5-7 years you break up community!
I am not arguing for or against any particular social/economic organization. I don't know what would work actually. But many of the standpoints here are argued from a fundamentalist standpoint.
What I know is that as I look over the American social and economic landscape, I don't like what I see.
George, as a Divorced Dad, all I can say is: GO FUCK YOURSELF.
I gotta second that. I'm a divorced dad raising his kids in a rented inner city apartment. Is that more or less pathetic than buying a stucco box in the boonies? Is there a pathos commission that can give me an official ruling on that?
It's amazing how every opportunity to talk about real issues devolves into tirades about People I Don't Have Sympathy For (or, for some, How the Government Ruins Everything) -- usually based on some imaginary backstory.
My own personal theory is that's all whistling past the graveyard. You read about people who've hit hard times and need to come up with some way to reassure yourself that: a. those people deserve whatever bad things happened to them, and b. you deserve whatever good things happened to you, so c. nothing bad can ever happen to you.
Our local paper's website has a comment section, and the comments for stories about the usual everyday tragedies are usually along the lines of "Darwin strikes again". After all, the commenters would never do something without thinking it all the way through, or be poor, or be in a bad neighborhood after dark, so they can rest assured they'll live forever.
The problem is that when a civilization provides an "educational" system that promotes consensus over independent, critical thought, the predictable result is a stupid, inert populace incapable of separating the wheat from the chaff. Of course these houses got sold - it only takes a knowledge of the current "memes" to create a pitch that works.
This society is run by computers that use statistical models to control the population and it's a real SOS recipe. Makes you look at a FICO score in a whole new way.
Stop looking for exotic motivational reasons. The consensual groupthink stupidity that comes from a bad education covers a lot of bases and you can bet most of the people in these exurbs have self-selected.
It's not a housing problem. It's us and I don't suppose we'll change for the better anytime soon.
I'm not picking on the kids here, by the way. Individually they're just victims as are most of us.
Knowing the truth hasn't set me free but at least I know I'm in prison. That's not a happy observation but it's a start, I suppose. You can't break out if you don't know you're in.
Well, if we are going to wax nostalgic on this thread, I grew up in a small town (pop 4,000) in northern Calif. Us kids could and did hop on our bikes and be out of sight from the house in two minutes. With the logging roads in the woods nearby, we were gone for hours. If something happened, our parents would have no idea where to start looking. Curiously, nothing bad happened. My mother's idea of a bad day was when it was raining so hard us kids had to stay inside.
Sidewalks are over-rated. Pedestrians in the street make good targets with points based on ability to dodge traffic and if you are the pedestrian/biker, you can hone your awareness and dodging skills. It's a win-win situation.
all the anti-subs writers live in cities. Pick the best cities and yhou will see you can not afford to live there! I have lived in twso of Am greatest cities but now, married, with kids, give me a decent school system every time. Fact: 50 of highschool kids in cities do not graduate!
Hey, I like fondue. You have a problem with melted cheese and bread?
The only problem I had with the woman sending her kid on the subway was that she only gave him a bunch of quarters for pay phones. There's not that many pay phones in the city, and they're pretty skeevy. Man, I remember when there was a big hubbub about kids having beepers in high school. Oy.
The aerial view of Maricopa made it painfully obvious where each of the developers had built their subdivisions. That place isn't a city, it's just a convenient intersection of two highways where multiple unrelated residential subdivisions were built.
Another problem is the size of the houses the 1.85 kids rattle around in. When the kids are in one wing and the parents in another, stupid things can happen. My old neighborhood, starter houses of the late 1950's, had 2,3,4 kids growing up in 1,000, 1,100 sq. ft. houses. These places were too small for us to get away with anything too stupid at home; the grownups would know. We had to look elsewhere for our stupids. Add the fact it was a working-class neighborhood; no adults going off on frequent weekend excursions leaving teens behind, no 'second home' for anyone I knew.
Now that I think about it, how did so many of us get so screwed up when there was so much oversight?
A bit OT, but I too loved the "fondue-fork wielding crowd" reference. Throw in some butane kitchen torches and we've got a Williams-Sonoma lynch mob. Being a transplant to the semi-urban world myself, I find I'm irritated by a certain superiority in that suburbanite handwringing about the city.
And yet, statistically, the kids are more at risk to dying from injuries in a latte-spill induced S-swerve in their parents' 45K top-heavy rollover-prone family-room-on-wheels.
In Tokyo, you see grade-schoolers on the subway with their [insert latest anime craze here] lunchpails. Granted, that is a far safer nation, but it just goes to show how different our relative perceptions of safety can be.
Like Tanta, I grew up in Smallville and biked everywhere, but unlike today's suburban sprawl, my community had been zoned at the turn of the century and was very bike-able. I shudder to think of kids trying to bike around some of the sidewalk-less 4-lane-highway-riddled suburbs of my city. Talk about unsafe!
Baron
Who writes the rules, the hedgies? the 6% NRA rule of thumb? Caveat Emptor?
Just for semantic fun, the 1st search item from Google pn answers.com : "A rule or order prescribed for management or government; prescription; a regulating principle; a governing direction; precept; law; as, the regulations of a..."
It is all subject to the whims of money and power see Glass-Stegall Nice article at Demise of Glass-Stegall Alters Role of Banks, Brokers, Insurers - Memphis Business Journal:
The problem as I stated above is us. The money buys the access and us, read thoughts to action, were given the power in the D of I and the Constitution to vote. If we let the money tell us how to vote, guess who gets both the power and money.
"It's not what you know but who you know" How do you get to know a politician, check or money order?
A classic demarcation can be seen in the purported philosophy of the rich Republicans with their money voters and the loving Democrats with their downtrodden voters. But, how many poor members of Congress do you count?
Compare the median in their districts and states. Look at them from a demographic standard, age and sex etc.
My best friend told me years ago watch where the money goes. On one of the news shows this morning, uh, I channel surf and forget, McCain is possibly toast because he can't raise enough money?
Back to the kids, How 'bout that charitable contribution of your TIME?
How about that drumbeat of woe is me that brings mediocrity to our schools? Did ya know at about 30 years of teaching in CA, retired teachers get up to 95% of their last years of salary in retirement until they die? Did ya know you can retire from the state government and get contracted as a consultant and make scads more? Are you in such a group? Is it O.K. that our society can't keep kids in school even with all the money we throw at it and spend because the CA Teachers Assoc has a fabulous lobbying effort for their members but to fire a teacher, gad zooks, the horror?
Yea Hah, any one got a fix?
I would suggest that any sidewalk was a waste of money and indicates poor tought processes on the part of the planners.
baron samedi | 04.06.08 - 12:48 pm | #
If they had really been planning they would have put no sidewalks in - from the sales data looks like no ones gonna alive there anyway so who would be walking?
sdrenter writes:
George, as a Divorced Dad, all I can say is: GO FUCK YOURSELF.I gotta second that.
I triple that. I give honor and respect to any divorced parent who has to raise their kids. I am not divorced but I see too many who are and its darn hard for 2 parents to raise kids nowadays and work, pay the bills, spend time with the kids, do homework, etc. There is no time for the parent, being always on the run.
What concerns me is that there are damn too many divorces and families get hurt. my thoughts are with you and your family SDrenter.
Bob in MA
"I remember once when there was a random killer about, someone had been shotgunned in an alley a block up from ours."
Ahh, the old Mt. Pleasant/Adams Morgan random shotgun guy that the cops couldn't find - even though they had full description and the guy repeatedly struck in about a one mile radius. I lived there at the time. I think I would have made the kids play indoors or at least go on a playdate in Georgetown.
I once lived in an old neighborhood in Fullerton, taking care of a deceased relatives home while the family decided what to do with it. the relative had lived there since the place was built- 1950's. Many of the original owners, or their kids, still lived there, and they all knew each others family histories; neighborhood sweethearts, war dead, births- real Mi Familia stories.
every front yard or over-the-fence conversation eventually turned to complaining about the new folks moving to the neighborhood: "investment homeowners" who didn't talk to anyone and who's kids you never saw outside. they were always saddened, usually saying something like: "the neighborhood is dying".
some neighborhoods, like all the Maricopas out there, start out dead.
By the way what would prevent the school system from converting one of the elementary schools to a high school?
In that ideal small town I referred to above, one year a kid did not want to go back to school at the end of summer so he burned the junior high to the ground (totally awesome fire!). The school district coped by sending the high school kids to school in the remaining building from 6AM to noon. The junior high went from noon to 6PM. Everybody involved hated that kid with a passion. ...on the other hand, the town got a new school out of the deal...
By the way what would prevent the school system from converting one of the elementary schools to a high school?
As far as I can tell, the deal here is that elementary schools can be located in inhabited neighborhoods, but if it's a high school it has to be miles from everyone's backyards. So they couldn't turn the elementary schools into high schools, because the buildings were already in neighborhoods. It would be like turning the elementary school into a jail. Or something.
At least that's what seems to be the case. I feel like someone who is reading something in a foreign language she doesn't read often enough to be fully confident in.
I roamed around freely since I was 4 and I never got killed. Just gave me a sense of independence. In my opinion, parents are over-protective because they are more worried about what other parents will think of them versus their concern for their kids.
At least that's what seems to be the case. I feel like someone who is reading something in a foreign language she doesn't read often enough to be fully confident in.
Tanta | 04.06.08 - 1:12 pm | #
Besides the boys would all have to get on their knees to pee in the 'men's room'... not a pretty thought.
all the anti-subs writers live in cities. Pick the best cities and yhou will see you can not afford to live there! I have lived in twso of Am greatest cities but now, married, with kids, give me a decent school system every time. Fact: 50 of highschool kids in cities do not graduate!
I don't think that's entirely true. I grew up in an inner ring suburb largely laid out in the 20s. It had/has one of the best school districts in the state and was almost entirely walkable. (Of course, there was a story in the paper today that the school district invested in a CDO, sheesh).
I'm also curious what sort of city you would want to consider. I live in a smaller city now, which has some fine schools, and some which are not.
Namely: It is an unassailable truth of the universe that the best place to raise kids is in a "nice house."
I disagree with this too. Actually its the opposite. Smaller houses promote better and closer inter-family relations.
When I was growing up, some of the happiest, most likeable, well-adjusted kids we knew came from small houses, shared bedrooms, etc. Maybe the trend toward private bedrooms and large houses is part of the cause of the breakdown in the family.
As a single mom, I raised my two sons in Tucson during the 70's. From pre-school to the fifth grade. I had to work, so I found a job which would enable me to go to work early and come home when school was over. I left home at about 5:00AM and the kids were on their own to get up, get their breakfast, and walk to school. I would call them regularly from work. For play, they rode their bikes around the neighborhood and generally had "adventures" with other kids. I made the conscious choice that I was not going to raise them to be fearful, but to be adventurous. Such behavior (on my part) nowadays would have someone calling child protective services.
However, my youngest son eventually found himself rowing boats down the Colorado River and traveling the world for a short tv series; my oldest spent one summer living in the woods (near Flagstaff) and playing his viola on the street. Neither of them is fearful of life. (Which is not to say they haven't had some scary...for Mom...experiences.) Kudos to the Mom who sent her son off riding the subway.
My old neighborhood, starter houses of the late 1950's, had 2,3,4 kids growing up in 1,000, 1,100 sq. ft. houses.
You know, those houses are still there, and probably still have kids living in them. Not everyone lives the lifestyle we see on TV. Not everyone even wants to.
Hey rent_to_own
Lived in Germany years ago and remember watching the Polizie go thru the parking lot trying door handles, one opens!, they'd write a ticket, drop in on the seat, lock the door and move onto the next.
"I disagree with this too. Actually its the opposite. Smaller houses promote better and closer inter-family relations."
This is getting a little wierd now.
Actually the best place to raise a child is in a log cabin in the early 1800's where they can read by the fire and grow up to be president and free the slaves.
Perhaps Maricopa's next community will be log cabins with no electricity and outhouses....for the good of the children.
(Actually the best place to raise a child is in a family that loves them. Now can we get back to how these stupid $%##'s blew a housing bubble that is now crashing and every last one of us is secretly enjoying the show)
Look, peeps. When I write something as sophomoric as "It is an unassailable truth of the universe," you can bet your last fondue fork that what is going on here is some variety of critique.
Did you all go to high school in Maricopa, or what?
Besides the boys would all have to get on their knees to pee in the 'men's room'... not a pretty thought.
I always trust you to zero in on the really important details that bring these nebulous social issues into stark clarity. You pisser.
Throw in some butane kitchen torches and we've got a Williams-Sonoma lynch mob.
Yes, but--HA!--the Stepford kids have taken over THE ONLY SUPERMARKET IN TOWN! You imagine these poor Williams-Sonoma mobsters, huddled in their perfect kitchens with their deadly equipment, having no fondue for supper tonight since they're afraid to walk into Fry's for cheese! Didja notice the interviewed kid noodling around with a hunk of cheese that was on its way back to the dairy case? Heh. Bet it was confiscated from one of the forking parents.
My old neighborhood, starter houses of the late 1950's, had 2,3,4 kids growing up in 1,000, 1,100 sq. ft. houses.
You know, those houses are still there, and probably still have kids living in them. Not everyone lives the lifestyle we see on TV. Not everyone even wants to.
sdrenter | 04.06.08 - 1:19 pm | #
We raised three kids in a house like that only older (circa 1915). We choose the location because it was walking distance to all the schools swimming pool (they were swimmers) and ice rinks (and played hockey)... worked pretty well until they built the new high school on the edge of town (about a miles away by crow and three miles by road - the youngest is in HS now and still walks home - straight line through orchards & woods & climbs up and over a 200-300 foot bluff).
There are still lotsa places like this - the world isn't all Maricopaed.
Have never seen them the police do that, but if a kid (or anyone, actually) gets in your car and causes damage or injury, you are at fault, because you did not prevent the other party from their actions.
I find the reasoning more than a bit strange, but then, it is another country.
Average Joe,
The problem with growing up in log cabins is they promote the wearing of funny, tall hats and the use of the word "score." Give me a yurt any day.
The problem with growing up in log cabins is they promote the wearing of funny, tall hats and the use of the word "score." Give me a yurt any day.
Elvis | 04.06.08 - 1:26 pm | #
dryfly writes:
I would suggest that any sidewalk was a waste of money and indicates poor tought processes on the part of the planners.
baron samedi | 04.06.08 - 12:48 pm | #
If they had really been planning they would have put no sidewalks in - from the sales data looks like no ones gonna alive there anyway so who would be walking?
That too, but these are subdivisions planned around 2+ car homeowners, who don't walk when they can drive.
p.a.'s comment above about houses that have the parents in one wing and the kids in another also plays into this.
Subdivisions like these fill a sociological role, albeit a bad one. Until we can understand that role is, we will just keep coming up with bad ideas.
Yeah, rent_to_own
I think it's because they don't have enough lawyers. One would need lawyers to be able to blame the other guy's actions for the irresponsible actions of the owner.
Lots of lawyers here in the USA and plenty of case law and them pesky regulations to support them in assessing blame.
I want to disabuse the notion that excessive city planning is causing Maricopa's problems. The only planning was by developers. The original Maricopa that I saw 20 years ago still exists, the developers blew that off and started from scratch a mile or two before coming from Compton Terrace mkII.
The CAP has caused more problems than it solved(the destruction of Tucson's water infrastructure is a great place to start), but it should've made more sense to replace ag with something less water intensive: somehow they've even screwed this one up.
New developments on the west side have to obtain 100 year water rights, but that's a pinky in the dike.
But as long as SRP is my water provider I'm gonna let my mini orchard run wild.
What's more jail like: to live in a rural area with few amenities for the kids, or for parents to be afraid to let their kids actually do anything for fear of being accused of neglectful child abuse if their kids did something "un-safe"? It's a 2-way street of confinement.
luvin_grits writes:
Baron
Who writes the rules, the hedgies? the 6% NRA rule of thumb? Caveat Emptor?
If they published the rules before you signed the contract, then yes.
If the rules were created by the contract and there is a dispute, then there is already a system in place to resolve the dispute.
From what I have seen so far, most of the mess that we are in is not the result of the breach of governmental regulation, it's the result of people not following the rules of the contract.
baron samedi writes:
"...it's the result of people not following the rules of the contract."
(Someday I'll take time to learn the italicky stuff, maybe)
So Caveat Emptor wins.
In addition, I know 2 people who own in Maricopa, one whom I told 2 years ago to sell at 10% off the comps and the other I told not to buy 2 years ago.
Neither listened, and the latter ate to relieve the stress which killed her income stream of intertube pRon.
The former now comps me drinks for investment advice.
We aren't talking about running down to the grocery store for a gallon of milk. Real Estate is is a complex transaction, crossing several professional fields that no layman can be reasonably expected to understand completely, and the financial markets doubly so.
If the buyers couldn't be bothered to protect themselves by having a specailst look at the investment, then yes, Caveat Emptor wins.
Gotta love this site, makes me go learn and sometimes, relearn stuff. That caveat guy has a reverse image, Caveat Venditor, "Let the seller beware."
See, the buyer is now walking because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, advisors in the real estate deal. Y'all know that old saying...Screw me once....
See, the buyer is now sitting out because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, ratings agencies in the securitization markets. Second verse, same as the first... Screw me once...
Everyone makes friends at this store, Howard explained. This is the hangout for Maricopa.
Cue the Cheers theme song. It songs like a lovely place. Their version of Cliff and Norm probably hangout in the liquor aisle. Hope they don't show up on the Tonight Show when Fry's finally closes, though.
I am somewhat forced to live in Phoenix, and what do I see?
Overweight kids and overweight people. Why? Because it's too fucking hot to walk or ride a bike if you're a kid. And the only free thing to do out of the heat is to hang out at the food zoo of the mall.
So culture here is Abercrombie and Fitch kids in their $1,000,000 homes with the maid and the nanny off the golf course, or overweight goths at one corner of the mall or anorexic emos at the other corner.
If I had to hang out at a mall when I was a kid, I would kill myself or do meth. Luckily, these kids have chosen to eat food and do meth.
luvin_grits writes:
Gotta love this site, makes me go learn and sometimes, relearn stuff. That caveat guy has a reverse image, Caveat Venditor, "Let the seller beware."
See, the buyer is now walking because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, advisors in the real estate deal. Y'all know that old saying...Screw me once....
See, the buyer is now sitting out because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, ratings agencies in the securitization markets. Second verse, same as the first... Screw me once...
May I suggest you take up bumper bowling as a hobby?
I just thought of something - anytime I've looked at houses ( 5 so far in my life ), a key metric was access to (good) schools, via catchment area( in a public school quota type system) or just because they were there ( or NOT) , local school quality etc - not because we have kids - we don't - but because that's a key input into property values ! Access to the YMCA, swimming pools, health centers, soccer fields, local good vets and as I got older, good medics were also important inputs into the value/price of a house.
Why weren't the people buying in Maricopa checking on the high school aspect and either discounting the price appropriately or just not moving there ? Yup, as I think more about this, once again I edge in the direction of "blame the victim" type of thing.
Hjalmar Schacht formed the limited liability company Metallurgische Forschungsgesellschaft, m.b.H., or "MEFO" for short. The company's "mefo bills" served as bills of exchange, convertible into Reichsmark upon demand. MEFO had no actual existence or operations and was solely a balance sheet entity. The bills were mainly issued as payment to armaments manufacturers.
Mefo bills were issued to last for six months initially, but with the provision for indefinite three-month extensions. The total amount of mefo bills issued was kept secret.
Re: chacht negotiated several trade agreements with countries in South America, and South-East Europe, ensuring that Germany would continue to receive raw materials from those countries, but that they would be paid in Reichsmarks; thus ensuring that the deficit would not get any worse; whilst allowing the Nazis to deal with the gap which had already developed. Schacht also found an innovative solution to the problem of the government deficit by using mefo bills. He was appointed General Plenipotentiary for the War Economy in May 1934[6] and was awarded honorary membership of the Nazi Party and the Golden Swastika in January 1937.
Schacht had been president of the Reichsbank between 1923 and 1930, but had been dismissed. Now he would return in triumph. He felt vindicated. Within weeks, the ingenious solution to Germany's pressing financial woes would burst forth from his inventive brain.
"It was necessary," Schacht later explained, "to discover a method that would avoid inflating the investment holdings of the Reichsbank immoderately and consequently increasing the circulation of money excessively."
"Therefore," he went on, "I had to find some means of getting the sums that were lying idle in pockets and banks, without meaning for it to be long term and without having it undergo the risk of depreciation. That was the reasoning behind the Mefo bonds."
What were these "Mefo" bonds? Mefo was a contraction of the Metallurgische Forschungs-GmbH (Metallurgic Research Company). With a startup capitalization of one billion marks - which Hitler and Schacht arranged to be provided by the four giant firms of Krupp, Siemens, Deutsche Werke and Rheinmetall -- this company would eventually promote many billions of marks worth of investment.
So, The New York Times sends another pith-helmeted writer out into the heart of flyover country to investigate the culture and lifestyle of what they regard as primitive inhabitants. Of course, the reporter finds ennui here. It's boring compared to Manhattan.
I would hardly call Maricopa flyover country. To me it looks a lot a smaller version of San Jose on speed. And believe me you having grown up in San Jose I'm not being nice. The problem I have with places San Jose is that unlike flyover country and the dense neo-urban cities, there there is no real community. And people suffer greatly from the ill effects of social alienation and too much time spent in front of the idiot box. And thats not me being grumpy, most of the friends I grew up with felt the same way, and so too the younger people I've occasionally met from down there.
I believe that everything changed in the early seventies when we, as a society, decided we had to have two incomes in a family to live the good life. The kids did pay a price for that and continue to do so. No judgement here, just an observation.
Fry's Foods and Fry's Electronics are run by the same family. I recall chatting with John Fry just after the first Fry's Electronics opened in Sunnyvale in the 80's. This was right about when the commercial real-estate bust hit Silicon Valley, so doubtless he got his tilt-up space for a song.
John said that he'd been amazed at the haphazard way the electronics and computer stores marketed their stuff--and the size of the margins that were realized. He compared this to the supermarket mentality, where margins are razor-thin and volume is sky-high and stuff that doesn't sell doesn't get shelf space.
I recall the first store as being one of the few places that you could find Jolt cola--you'd see guys piloting hand trucks loaded with cases of it in the parking lot--there was also some really terrible sugar-free chocolate-flavored cola. But you could also buy a VME backplane or a big-screen TV there.
The shrewd thing was that he located the store in the middle of an industrial park and accepted corporate POs. So engineers looking for a certain part would just as soon visit Fry's on their lunch hour as place an order with Arrow or Hamilton-Avnet. It was also the place to browse looking at new technology--I remember buying my first box of Fuji 3.5" high-density floppies at Fry's; at $44, they had the best price in town.
Great post, Tanta -- there are so many worthy topics here, it's hard to know where to begin.
I lived in Tucson in the early 70's -- attended Pima Community College, lived in fixer uppers, in a tent in the desert, out of the back of my pickup truck in the desert, lived with friends, hitchhiked around the country, and generally had the best adventures of my youth.
It was apparent then that the white belt curmudgeon crowd was very influential in Arizona -- think of Goldwater Republicans, who want their private neighborhoods with free public golf courses and no kids and no schools and no taxes and free water from the CAP (paid for by the Feds) to fill their swimming pools -- in other words, your typical gimme-everything-I-want-so-I've-got-mine-and-screw-everyone-else Libertarian Republican.
In this case, the developers brought that attitude to Maricopa, and the commissioners didn't realize the problems that would follow.
On a related note, Green Valley Ranch in Denver is another nice-place-to-raise-your-kids subdivision -- but 20 years down the road, they have a 9 hole golf course but no High School. Which means the kids go to Montbello HS, which is located in the older (and more run down) suburb to the West. Both have been hard hit by the 80/20 ARM foreclosure crisis, but Montbello seems to be stabilizing a little; GVR is like our own little slice of the Inland Empire, right here in Colorado.
Ah, townhouse living in the inner suburbs. About 15 minutes ago there was a thumping noise on the wall behind the TV and then my son 7-yo disappeared only to return for his jacket. Now he is playing street tennis with the girl next door. In his church clothes.
It is nice to live in a neighborhood with some free-range kids. I thinks sometimes the parents don't let them out because there are no other kids out there--there's a certain feeling of safety with a small crowd of kids, you figure they're less likely to be snatched by a man in a car or something.
If you read early, you'd know I work in housing. Part is site selection, part is asset mgmt and most is property management with the attendant regulatory reading. I read ALL the relevant stuff and don't rely on just one opinion or frankly, trust single sources, in my work or personal finances.
I won't inflate myself to the decision making process but I do present and taken the questions and thus have learned how a bad deal can take down a company ( or individual).
Personal responsibility, in a perfect world free of greedy immoral and unethical crooks and fraudsters and those that prey on others, must be the ideal. Absent that perfection, what is your suggestion? Seems to me the current system without effective controls and subsequent penalties for the "bad guys" is going to make the next several years a socialistic party by those aforementioned voters who will punish everyone for the sins of those few.
Kids riding the subway. I rode the New York City Subway starting at age 8. By age 9 I went all over the city by myself. That included the Statue of Liberty, Grand Central Station, Empire State Building everywhere. It was great. My daughter was not so lucky. We lived in Oakland CA. While our neighborhood was beautiful and fairly safe, she never had the experiences I did. It's mainly public transportation. For a thin dime (dates me), I could get on the subway and go anywhere, and I did.
Is there a statute of limitations on shit done as kids???
One fine summer day at the age of 15 or so I drug one of the rusted wrecks of a car out of the neighbors yard with our tractor. We lived at that time on 5 acres on a pretty steep hill. See where this is going? So we put our dirtbike helments on,strap in and off we go down the hill. Drag car to top and do it again and again.
Well this gets boring so we build a RAMP. A ramp to get the car to flip on two wheels and roll over. Heck this kept us and the neighbor kids occcupied for a good couple of weeks...
Should I mention the ramp off the roof to jump our bikes into the pool?
Setting 1/2 full spraycans on a flat buring stump with fireplace tongs?
Oh,be thankful the average homeowner doesn't have a oxy aceteylene
torch setup...
Artical published on website of John Burns Real Estate Consulting
The Poster Child for Housing Excess:
The City of Maricopa, AZ
Nothing exemplifies the boom and bust of this cycle like the City of Maricopa, Arizona. A distant Phoenix suburb, the city's growth has been phenomenal:
1,040 people in March 2000
4,998 people in March 2004
24,625 people in July 2006
33,000 today
The city incorporated in 2003 and subsequently issued 11,350 building permits from 2005 through 2007. I visited the city again last month and I must say it is meticulously planned with beautiful new homes, schools and parks.
However, growth comes with a price, and that price was best illustrated when I got out of my car and read the foreclosure posters on the doors.
The tremendous growth that fueled Maricopa was driven by crazy speculative investment activity, both by investors and those who moved their families into the city. Some new homes have been reduced in price by 50% and are still not selling, because auction and bank-owned signs are everywhere. Why buy a brand new home from a builder in a community that will probably not be finished, when you can buy one in a completed community for less than the construction cost? To complicate matters, most potential new residents do not have a down payment saved.
City officials in Maricopa and many other high-growth cities have their work cut out for them. Construction in many outlying areas has ground to a halt, which means city officials in many cities will need to focus on all of the problems that come along with halted growth: abandoned homes, empty lots with stubbed utilities, infrastructure bonds that go into default, and rising local unemployment. I wish them well.
s there a statute of limitations on shit done as kids???
Not if you told your wife who nows tells you mother.
Every once in a while, Mom tells me how glad she is we never got caught.
Ann Landers once wrote the root word of teenager comes from the Greek (Roman?, it was a long time ago) for trouble.
Further full disclosure: the ideal small town I referenced above also has pot farms out in the woods (state owned) that I explored. Nowadays, you don't roam those woods without running into armed pot farmers.
Just another boom/bust cycle in the Arid-zone. Only this time with extra added attractions - like heightened levels of divorce, speculation through creative financing/no equity/equity extraction schemes/scams, and larger delusions of grandeur than in the past.
I'm a total product of this type of mindset. I was transplanted to the Arid-zone at the ripe old age of 10 from MA in the late 60's. Back then "Take your sinus's to Arizona" in bold print on slick color brochures declared, photographs of smiling people in western wear on horseback with panoramic unspoiled desert vistas and spectacular multicolored sunsets in the backgrounds. Reality was (and still is), anything but.
Nothing has been learned over the course of 40 years, and numerous cycles. Communities still spread and rise off the desert floor with no regard for creating or enhancing infrastructure prior to the onslaught. Years of unending road construction, drainage projects, school projects built long after the fact, business attraction sought through perk/exception/non-taxation, wasting/consumption of natural resources and energy still endures.
I'm still here (off and on), having survived my juvenile induction, even profiting from it. Frankly, it's contributed to my overall success in life, rather than detracting from it. I learned through real life experience what not to buy into.
Garage evolution theory (bonus material) - back then new houses came with single or double carports. Slowly over the years they lost favor, giving way to 2 car garages. 3 car garages are the new and approved gold standard. There are even some 4 and 5 car options becoming more widely available, including extended length/height options for those monster SUV's and pickup trucks. A few areas are sporting super duper size detached RV garages (some of which are so tall and outsized, they dwarf the McMansions they sit beside). Most of these garages are increasingly employed to store stuff, not just vehicles anymore.
I remember telling my suburban friends that as kids we used to take guns to school - bring them right in and put them in our lockers. Pump shot guns, semi-auto 22s etc. We did that because the wrecks we drove didn't lock real well and you didn't want to leave the guns in them unattended... you know some 'irresponsible' person might get a hold of them as opposed to us 'responsible' sixteen year olds.
My friends ask... did the teachers know, what did they say? I tell them heck ya they knew... they would say..."Nice shot gun, how much did it cost? Did you stop at Goose Lake this morning on the way in? Get any?"
That world is as long gone as Abe Lincoln's candle light 'schoolin'. Now you'd probably do time in federal prison for bringing a shot gun to school even if it stayed locked in the trunk of your car.
And 'yes' the guys did hunt in the morning. I rarely did because I was an athlete & trained mornings. Many of my friends did stop & hunt ducks on their way in - unlike weekends there were no adults to compete with for the best spots.
This is a great thread actually. I think most are missing the point of what Tanta is saying. It is not about any individual's motives, it is about our culture. We need to examine our CULTURE!
Americans have a problem with this. I learned this two decades ago in the honors section of Sociology 1001. The professor walked in the first day and said:
"For the purposes of this class, I want you to assume that individuals don't make decisions. Everything is determined by group interactions. Now, you know that that isn't true, and I know that that isn't true, but it's how I want you to think for the purposes of this class."
There were two or three of these students, who were all pretty bright, that simply couldn't do this. When we were discussing divorce rates, and how they had climbed over the years, these folks couldn't move past the idea that there were just more individuals deciding to get divorces. It was very odd to watch.
I, too, work in the industry, as a land title underwriter, and also do not rely on any one source, since my company will be held accountable if there is problem with a transaction (deep pockets theory and all). And I to have learned that a bad decision can cause a company to go under (as I sit with my fingers crossed, waiting for the economy to take out several of the less reputable and fly by night companies in my market).
Having been subpoenaed by the FBI, the local LEA and private parties, I can assure you that there are systems in place to deal with both criminal fraud and breach of contract. And they are effective- several people are now in jail for fraud and a number of companies have shut down as a result of having been in bed with the bad guys.
As far as there being a Democrat in the White House this next time around, it became a fore gone conclusion when the economy went tango uniform and no one in DC seemed to notice.
And as far as the bumper bowling comment, youre a Texan son, so suck it up.
Further full disclosure: the ideal small town I referenced above also has pot farms out in the woods (state owned) that I explored. Nowadays, you don't roam those woods without running into armed pot farmers.
other jim | 04.06.08 - 3:01 pm | #
They did then too - have since the 40s in a lot of rural America where migrants went. Mexican migrants were growing pot allover the high plains as long as anyone can remember.
The key was most of the growers then KNEW you weren't after their pot - rather you were after deer, rabbits, etc. They wouldn't mess with you because it would bring the heat down on them BIG TIME...
It was an understood truce - you don't touch their crop, don't turn them in - they leave you alone. Besides in much of rural America - you KNEW the grower or his family... why would you mess with his 'shit'? Who did you like/trust better? Them or the feds/state?
The meth heads are a totally different matter - chemical induced paranoia is beyond any sort of reason or 'loyalty'. Fortunately most of the speed cookers did it in an abandoned farm house - you wouldn't run into them hunting.
Prof Elizabeth Warren in her video posted last night points out that builders don't build starter homes anymore. In the '70s middle class couples had to built up considerable equity in the two houses they traded up before buying a 3000 sq. ft. house. Homeowners described in this article, in effect, bought a house the size of the third home purchased by a family in the 70's without the equity cushion. Forced to bet "double or nothing", they are experiencing the predictable result.
I realize that this thread has spiraled off onto other topics, but I figured I would contribute my experience. I had the fortune/misfortune to spend a bit of time in Maricopa, doing some work at one the the "low-profile" car testing sites nearby. Maricopa was 3/4 of the way from Phoenix to where we were going (middle of nowhere), but much of that drive was through empty desert. When we passed through Maricopa, all of us in the car had the same thought.... Who in their right mind would build a town here? If you want to build a community that has to commute to Phoenix, why not choose the first piece of empty desest closest to Phoenix? The auto testing facilities and the Indian casino (and the Fry's) certainly don't support enough jobs to sustain the rate of building they were doing. Then, assuming you had a good reason for building in the middle of the empty desert, why would you cram the houses so close together you could reach out the kitchen window and touch your neighbors house? These were cookie cutter houses banged out at the maximum possible speed. I would hate to see what is behind the walls. We would see the roofers moving from house to house every day we drove through. Plus, as the icing on the cake, it was just around the corner from the biggest cow feed-lot I have ever seen. Depending on your proximity and the prevailing weather patterns, the place smelled like a cow's butt, to put it mildly.
Also, I will second what Mykingdomforanos said. The Fry's in Maricopa, was definitely a grocery store. It was probably the largest grocery store I have ever been in, and was certainly the pinnacle of civilization there.
It is sad to see what has happened, but I can't say it was completely unexpected. That place felt like bizarro world from day 1.
"For the purposes of this class, I want you to assume that individuals don't make decisions. Everything is determined by group interactions. Now, you know that that isn't true, and I know that that isn't true, but it's how I want you to think for the purposes of this class."
In a sense though, it is true. As an individual, I make decisions all the time but I am influenced to one degree or another by others, near and far.
Going back to that nostalgic ideal small town I first grew up in, we left when my parents decided us kids "needed" better schools as teenagers because that is what various people and society told them. So Dad took a transfer to SoCal (Riverside) and this poor country boy was shellshocked.
I could ride my bike for miles in any direction (well only two to the east) and still be in town. Had to ride my bike on the street because there was some stupid rule about riding on sidewalks.
I do wonder why in this age of Google, telephones and subscriptions to local papers, why people would move to an empty town without checking first to see if it is suitable for their family. I always thought the rule was, rent for a year before you buy when you move to a new town, so you are not stuck if you don't like the area.
I grew up in Colorado and moved to Tucson when I turned 21 -- one of the striking differences was the attitude towards water.
In Arizona, water comes out of the tap or a well and there's an unlimited supply; back then, something like 90% of the developed water was used by agriculture, for cotton and other crops.
Colorado has some of the best water laws in the country -- development began in the 1800's, with a first in time, first in line doctrine of prior appropriation. Beyond that, the state Constitution says that water priority is Municipal, Commercial, then Agricultural -- which led to the Irrigation Ditch Rights condemnation lawsuits back in the 1970's. Since they were going to lose anyway, the farmers accepted a 110% replacement trade with the City of Thornton -- 110% recycled water for the 100% fresh water they gave up.
The majority of water in Colorado is still used for agriculture, but that is changing; Aurora has appropriated most of the state's share of the Arkansas River, which has meant the end of flood irrigation in Rocky Ford. The farmers have adapted, using drip irrigation -- they still grow the best melons in the world. (Rocky Ford Melons: hot days + cool nights = high sugar content. California Melons = orange colored cardboard.)
Last year, the state shut down hundreds of irrigation wells on farms in the Platte Valley. Some of these wells dated back to the 1940's, but it was determined that they were depleting the aquifer -- and since they were junior rights, no more water. It sucked for the farmers, but it was good conservation practice.
On the positive side in Arizona, Tucson is using their CAP water to recharge the aquifer.
Kids on the subway: I used to ride buses and BART (the Bay Area's subway) across the bay from Oakland to San Francisco every day starting at age 10. I would go all over the place on my own, and never had a problem. From time to time, a crazy/weird person might try to talk to me, but I knew not to engage. And I was in the middle of the city, surrounded by other adults, perfectly safe. Never had a problem. This was in the late 70s-80s. I would love for my kids to have the same independence.
Dryfly, you are an exceptional storyteller. I hope you consider writing someday in your spare time. An updated Little House on the Prairie.
Outsider | 04.06.08 - 3:30 pm | #
Thanks for the compliment. I've thought about it but don't think I have the gift - but I was there where a lot of the rubber hit the road for sure. I was in rural schools in the mid-south during forced integration (literally months after MLK was shot)... then moved up into the rural midwest as the early 70s 'liberation' ran into good ol'boy.
I was a watcher and a wanderer and saw a lot of stuff happen. I made friends on all sides of the story. I am still trying to make sense out of it all. Probably never will completely.
As I recall dryfly, you live a little north of where Mark Twain grew up on the Mississippi. Nice to see that the old storyteller-as-an-observer-of-life tradition hasn't died out up here.
Times never change, just the names, but people today are far less educared and far fatter, in general:
Hazlitt's "On Southey's Letter to William Smith" is to be found in Political Essays (1819). Letters to William Smith, Esq. M.P. from Robert Southey, Esq. which appeared on May 4, May 11th and May 18th of 1817.
...he, the writer of the Inscription on Old Sarum, describes "a Reformer is no better than a housebreaker; he, the writer of the Inscription at Chepstow Castle, calls all those who do not bow their necks to the doctrine of Divine Right, Rebels and Regicides: he, the author of Wat Tyler, calls those persons who think taxes, wars, the wanton waste of the resources of the country, and the unfeeling profligacy of the rich, likely to aggravate and rouse to madness the intolerable sufferings of the poor, "flagitious incendiaries, panders to insurrection, murder, and treason, and the worst of scoundrels";
...e professes to be a convert, and by consigning over to a "vigour beyond the law" all those who expose his unprincipled, pragmatical tergiversations, or would maintain the system itself, without maintaining those corruptions and abuses, which were all that Mr Southey at one time saw to hold up to exercration in the English Constitution, and are all that he now sees to admire and revere in it. This is as natural in a Renegado, as it would be unaccountable in any one else.
This thread brings back memories of a book I was assigned as a college freshman: "Growing Up Absurd" by Paul Goodman (1960).
"The book puts forward the idea that western society is a paradise of consumerism, a 'confused, seduced, spoiled mass society' staggering from one problem to the next.
"HICAGO (Reuters) - Investors who have never sat behind the wheel of a tractor are helping drive the price of U.S. farmland to record levels, attracted by its assumed safety following the meltdown in mortgage-related securities and excited by the potential of plant-based biofuels.
But is agricultural land really a good long-term investment? Or could the rush into rural real estate be just another Wall Street craze -- one that ends like the Internet and housing manias that preceded it?
An analysis of rents -- a key measure of U.S. cropland values -- suggests the returns investors can expect from farmland are not only substantially below those available in the stock market but in a long-term decline to boot.
That disconnect -- between fast-rising farmland prices on the one hand and fast-falling returns from farmland rents on the other -- has some growers and government officials worried a bubble may be forming, one similar to the one that took hold 30 years ago and left rural America reeling once it popped.
Iowa Bank Superintendent Thomas Gronstal is among those concerned. "Current agricultural conditions," Gronstal told lawmakers in U.S. Senate testimony on March 4, "are reminiscent of conditions experienced in the 1970s, which led to the economic and financial collapse of the 1980s."
Gronstal said soaring crop prices made "the agricultural sector look strong." But he warned that retreats in those prices could have an immediate and devastating effect on land values.
"If there has been too much leveraged or loaned against the inflated value of farmland, the bubble will burst and we will once again experience an economic crisis similar to that of the 1980s," Gronstal said.
"It is nice to live in a neighborhood with some free-range kids. I thinks sometimes the parents don't let them out because there are no other kids out there--there's a certain feeling of safety with a small crowd of kids, you figure they're less likely to be snatched by a man in a car or something."
That's the key to many of these misty-eyed stories about the good old days: a lot of other kids around, and some adults that everybody knew and could go to.
Though the best years of my childhood were spent in a neighborhood that would be kryptonite by today's standards.
I too, was sometimes gone on my bike from morning till nite and this wasn't a small town, this was Baltimore. I was warned never to take candy from strangers, and not to chase my ball into the street, we'll get you a new ball if it gets squashed. I walked home from school from 1st or 2nd grade. We locked our doors. There was a pool 5 blocks away to walk to in the summer.
EVERYBODY was treated this way. If we didn't bike, we walked & explored.
Had adventures. Our kids, now 38 and 27 were pretty much treated the same way. They are both independent and working and successful.
They walked or were bused to school.
I can't understand what's going to happen to the over protected kids of today.
I don't know of any kids who were hurt, except a couple who where abused right at home by funny uncles or 2nd husbands. There was one kid who was weird, but he got hurt blowing his face up with a chemistry set right at home.
This is utterly hilarious to see folks misunderstand the drive till you qualify crowd.
As for Pinal County, the home of cotton farmers and good old boys, the last real estate bust established that whomever "Git 'er done." was the winner in development.
As for pounding out the houses, the houses actually use less water than the foolish alfalfa and cotton flood irrigated fields they filled.
The late 90s settlement of water rights meant that a lot of the water that had been cheap was going to the tribes, and that the developers would pay big money for those water rights remaining to stick their subdivisions wherever the sups would approve maximum concentration. The subdivisions were being planted ahead of a sea change in the water rights, with a sustainable change in water rights made last year when Pinal County became an AMA, with recharge requirements (See the DWR rulemaking for more). Essentially you could no longer use the old cotton irrigation wells and draw down the local aquifer without putting water back in- gee can you say much higher costs?
Who, in their right mind, would donate the land, as the school district was asking, in the midst of their subdivision? In this case, the developers were pushing things in 640 acre blocks were correct. The real reason that the high school was not being built quickly enough is the school district (which has always existed in the greater area), had a high school in Casa Grande that they didn't want falling enrollment to endanger. Local politics explains almost all the bad economic development.
ADOT is responsible for the lackadasical construction of roads, but hey, we are ten years behind the development in Phoenix, so what else is new?
In other words, this was leapfrog style development Arizona style, with a concomitant collapse as easy money has left. Gee, is this 2008 or 1988?
HICAGO (Reuters) - Investors who have never sat behind the wheel of a tractor are helping drive the price of U.S. farmland to record levels, attracted by its assumed safety following the meltdown in mortgage-related securities and excited by the potential of plant-based biofuels.
But is agricultural land really a good long-term investment? Or could the rush into rural real estate be just another Wall Street craze -- one that ends like the Internet and housing manias that preceded it?
If you assume that the markets are rational you basically have to conclude that investors figured out just in the past few months that people in India and China actually eat.
Just like people got religion one strange day in August 2007 (coincidentally when the Fed cut rates at the discount window) and figured out, for the first time in history, that people in India and China use oil.
My Dad moved our family out of Manhattan but we kept the same dentist in midtown. I used to love riding the train alone to his office (8 or 9 years old). I guess the ride home would have been cool too if he hadn't been such a freaking sadistic psychopath. Novocaine was for crybabies, as well as water cooled drills. Oh, the smell of it, yeah he was full blooded German too, that helped.
"s have increasingly less access to public space. Classic 1950s hang out locations like the roller rink and burger joint are disappearing while malls and 7/11s are banning teens unaccompanied by parents. Hanging out around the neighborhood or in the woods has been deemed unsafe for fear of predators, drug dealers and abductors. Teens who go home after school while their parents are still working are expected to stay home and teens are mostly allowed to only gather at friends' homes when their parents are present.
Additionally, structured activities in controlled spaces are on the rise. After school activities, sports, and jobs are typical across all socio-economic classes and many teens are in controlled spaces from dawn till dusk. They are running ragged without any time to simply chill amongst friends. "
This has actually been going on for a long time. The whole suburban thing is probably another symptom, and not a cause. If we were concerned with providing teens with appropriate public space, it would exist in these communities as well, although it certainly can not help, as fishing for property value DOES change how we act towards youth. (Keeping them unseen basically)
As someone who advocates for this sort of thing, there's nothing in the post at all that I have any complaint with. It lays out the problems of the communities (and that the kids are dealing with it remarkably well). But I'll leave you with a thought.
The rise of the social internet has prevented probably a thousand Columbines.
Thanks Rob Dawg - they are trying to make it look like Brooklyn! Looks kinda undersold from the pics, but anyplace that helps its residents burn less gasoline and heating fuel is going to be a lot more sellable as time goes on.
Oh, and Dryfly, since I've seen you comment on this often recently, here's an article that my fiancee` sent me on the current farm land price bubble. - Andrew
If you assume that the markets are rational you basically have to conclude that investors figured out just in the past few months that people in India and China actually eat. -ac
Both statements are 'accurate' when balanced. There clearly is a growing need for Midwestern food production on the world stage. However the prices being paid for land today don't justify that demand.
There is clearly a bubble blowing in rural America.
One of the managers I work with just told me recently that when he was around 5 or 6, he and a group of friends from the neighborhood far west side of Chicago) would get one of the older boys (meaning 10 or so) along with their allowances and take the Addison bus all the way across Chicago and go to Cubs games by themselves.
The story they told their moms was that "they were playing baseball."
I guess they could to it for around 4 dollars or so, bleacher ticket, soda and hot dog in the stands and then a side trip to the baseball card store and a ride back home.
His mother still doesn't know. This would have been early 70's.
Both statements are 'accurate' when balanced. There clearly is a growing need for Midwestern food production on the world stage. However the prices being paid for land today don't justify that demand.
Yeah, I think that's an important distinction that needs to be made -- arguing that there's a bubble is not the same thing as arguing that prices shouldn't be going up or that there isn't a legitimate expectation for demand to increase.
In fact I think the underlying legitimacy is key to dragging rational people into the fray to begin with.
To argue that there's a bubble (as I see it) is just to argue that the market is severely distorting reality to profit a handful of players at the expense of everybody else.
"Also reminds me of the case in NY where a Danish woman left her infant outside on the sidewalk for some fresh air in February"
That one I remember. Even after the local tabloids published photos of Danish babes lined up in strollers in Copenhagen outside restaurants, the mommy outrage never faltered...as in how could she imagine Manhattan was as safe as Copenhagen.
I think they left NYC after they finally regained custody of their child.
The city child-protection services moved with lightening speed on this one. Couldn't resist going after an educated white woman--that she was Scandinavian was just icing on the cake. Would be more impressed if they could identify the kids being beaten and starved in this city, but the tiny victims seem to be identified only after their demise.
There is clearly a bubble blowing in rural America.
dryfly | 04.06.08 - 4:46 pm | #
I just looked around in NW Ohio where I still have relatives who farm. There is not a single farm for sale right now. Everything has been bought up. My dad sold the last of his land at 3-3.1k per acre in 2001-2002. Prime Ohio ground. Like I mentioned similar plats have sold for 10k per acre recently...Yep,that whole triple in price in three years will hold up...
All I will say 'bout guns in school is my youngest brother still brought one to school as late as 1990...
Also, one notable aspect of bubbles seems to be that informing people that there's a bubble doesn't necessarily dissuade them from participating in it because people just change their attitude: "OK there's a bubble, but I can get out before it bursts." And even though most participants will be wrong about their ability to time the ending, many of them will get it right and profit handsomely. Lacking this information ahead of time it's hard to argue that participating in a bubble is necessarily irrational. That's part of the reason it's hard to get rid of them and half-measures have a history of not working very well.
Again, I have to wonder if Bernanke is starting to rethink some of his criticism of the BoJ for keeping rates too high for too long (or if maybe it was just lip service).
It seems to me that we now have both a recession and bubbles at the same time. Something that suggests, to my pessimistic person, that any light at the end of the tunnel may be that proverbial oncoming train.
Go thru the first 3 pages and enter or select any Ca zipcode.
We have debated whether the apparent increase in number of sex offenders is due to our society's permissiveness or just better reporting. I would like to see a statistical study to determine which is true.
We recently talked about rebalancing. You might have come across this as well at Brad Setser's. I found it particularly interesting at a time of record price increases in AG commodities. Puts these counries into an extreme bind by not even be able to address the issues.
Yet, Saudi Arabia, the heavyweight of the nations, has long been reluctant to make such a move. When Kuwait moved the dinar to track a basket of currencies last May, the US was unimpressed and that was before the dollar started its rapid descent. Gulf government officials privately argue the US would view such a move now, when the global economy is already fragile, as equivalent to a declaration of economic war, which would have security consequences.
A central bank official (speaking on condition of anonymity) tells Bloomberg that US Embassy officials last week told central bank Governor Sultan Bin Nasser al-Suwaidi of their concern about reports that the sheikhdom may drop the peg against the USD. The official says that political leaders have stopped the bank from developing any plans to move toward another currency regime.
Someone up-post mentioned the rise of social (computer) networking, and that's what I've heard also - this generation is finding, making, and maintaining friends online. I see it in my daughter, glued to Facebook. She has about, oh, 90 friends plastered on her page. I say - Joe? Do you talk to Joe? No, she says, I don't talk to Joe, but he's a friend on my Facebook page. Every other teen in her group has the same phenomenon going on - contacting each other with "will you be my friend" Facebook entries to gather as many photos as possible, like it's some popularity contest. So these teens may be staying home more, but they may be interacting just the same. Weird social phenomenon. What's that gonna look like in the future?
RE - I think the US gov't is worried about $200/bbl oil... maybe? If they drop the peg & still owe a bunch in euros... and all they sell is oil... where does oil go? Up.
As long as the US imports as much oil as it does & runs huge deficits funded by others to support our consumption (private & public) then the dollar will get weaker and weaker.
There is no way around it - Setser was premature thinking the re-balance would happen a few years ago... that didn't make him wrong on the underlying forces... he just underestimated the resistance.
BTW, Maricopa has a local community, the Ex-urb types just don't belong.
Maricopa's longstanding "community" is as the crossroads of many sections of unincorporated county and reservation cropland. The latino farmworker and white hick types who already lived here 6 years ago when land was $3K/acre hang out at the local cafe/bar, or shooting tin cans, or riding dirt bikes, or working on their spreads.
I agree with you. I actually think that $200 oil is not beyond belief for several reasons.
However, I am worried that preventing these countries from depegging actually will likely backfire as I believe it increases the chance of extremely high oil prices by completely unhinging inflation expectations in countries that are already experiencing high inflation. Forcing them to import even more inflation can only make things worse.
This story in the Guardian is a perfect example of where we may head towards. I am very concerned.
We are steering towards a train wreck unless rebalancing continues gradually. With these developments, rebalancing will happen as a result of riots and I believe even China will be forced involuntarily into a sudden change of course at exactly the wrong time.
We are steering towards a train wreck unless rebalancing continues gradually. With these developments, rebalancing will happen as a result of riots and I believe even China will be forced involuntarily into a sudden change of course at exactly the wrong time.
RE | 04.06.08 - 5:57 pm | #
Agree. Here's another blog on the same subject - sort of - over at Angry Bear
Its like they don't even think about our consumption vs production 'imbalance' as an issue... it must be a God given right or something. The only question is how to keep it going... a little longer please, pretty please.
baron s--you are an underwriter? For all you non title people underwriters at title companies are the kings and queens of the real estate title law world.
I started working for an underwriter at Chicago Title when I first started practicing law.
Looking at a house just a couple of lots down from my own. Sold for $330,000 Jan 07. Sold for $199,000 Oct 07. REO being offered at $99,000. Think I'm going check this out. Probably needs at $25K but with decent financing and 20% down - could pay its way for about $600 monthly rental over 15 years. Backs up to a school.
RE writes:
I agree with you. I actually think that $200 oil is not beyond belief for several reasons.
RE...
Just remember we went from 40.00 oil to 8-10 in a couple of years. There was no/very little exploration in the nineties. Heck,none of the west coast of Florida is even open for exploration. I mentioned a while back a friend in Texas has been trying to get a couple of wells drilled on his property. 18 month minimum wait for a rig. The equipment is old and worn out. The problem is to increase production the needed equipment has a lead time of years...
You do know about the Bekkah(sp) oil field in the US,right?
Dry,
If and when there is a rebalancing trade between the US and China, will the US be able to reopen the closed industrial plants?
From my numbers perspective, I can't see how a plant can open and tool up in the US these days. It seems to me that once they're gone, they don't come back in this environment. However, my friend's specialty chemical employer did reopen in the US last year.
As an aside, we really don't know what the tax situation will be in a few years either. It could be very tough for entreprenuers to justify the risk.
If the govmint gets more money from tax cheats they will merely waste it. The tax cheats probably don't have the money anymore, so let's put 'em in jail which costs, what 40 grand a year apiece.
Please.
Also on the kid topic:
I soaped shop windows on Halloween. I and my friends would go in any empty house and explore. We never damaged a thing. If we had gotten caught, we would have got yelled at, but that's all. I shudder to think. . .
My hub used nitrogen tri iodide to weld a street car to the tracks. He was at the end of the line at a metal turnaround, the driver would go get coffee before his return run, and the expression on his face when the car wouldn't move. . . priceless.
He would have got in trouble then had he got caught. Now, he'd probably do hard time. He also set the street on fire, etc, etc.
Getting caught doing something bad and severely punished is worse than not getting caught as a kid, I think.
His life would have been ruined. Instead he is multiply degreed and works for NASA.
We recently talked about rebalancing. You might have come across this as well at Brad Setser's. I found it particularly interesting at a time of record price increases in AG commodities. Puts these counries into an extreme bind by not even be able to address the issues.
I'm surprised these countries haven't started pushing back a little. It seems like we're transporting alot of our problems overseas and getting away with it.
If our interest rate policy is starting to cause civil unrest in oil producing countries you'd think at some point they'd get the idea of threatening oil cutbacks if we keep devaluing the dollar.
Maybe that's why Bush has been trying to play nice with Russia recently.
I think it's an amusing idea, if I'm getting it right:
"OK, you say you make $150,000 a year on your loan application - time to start paying the taxes of somebody who makes $150,000 a year, not somebody who makes $25,000 a year."
If and when there is a rebalancing trade between the US and China, will the US be able to reopen the closed industrial plants?
From my numbers perspective, I can't see how a plant can open and tool up in the US these days.
Ya the old is toast - it will all be new stuff. The old plants aren't even suitable for outlet malls or 'Loft Fodder' for the most part.
Some can be reused, most can't.
But the plants aren't the real asset anyway - its the skills between the ears of the folks that ran those old plants that is the key. They are still valuable if we access them before they die... then they have to train the next generation freaking fast.
As for how will it happen? Combine 'bootstrapping' and 'guerrilla marketing' and that is how it can be done. With a weak dollar it might be the ONLY way we maintain consumption going forward.
There were a couple of really good books I read in the early nineties about this - how to do turnarounds on a shoe string. Have the books back on the shelf not far from my desk - might need them: "World Class Manufacturing" & "Industrial Marketer's Guide". Almost funny they are so dated... don't even mention the Chinese - the yellow peril then was all Japanese. But the strategy was rock solid then & still is: advocated 'bootstrapping' big time.
My kind of place! All of us neighbor kids used to get together and shoot clay pigeons in the open section right across the street. Ahhhh, those were the days!
OK I live in Phoenix and let me tell you, that NYT article captured the downside of living in Maricopa PERFECTLY (though I had no idea they had no high school).
It's 20 minutes away from civilization - that is, the nearest place with ANYTHING - movie theaters, decent shopping, and so on. Unless you like horseback riding or ATV riding, there is NOTHING to do there... unless you like gambling, there's an Indian casino at the south end of the town. But, of course, kids can't go there. This development was just plopped down in the middle of nowhere. It's the most bizarre thing, you can clearly see the core of the old rural Maricopa 'downtown' and then it looks like these ugly crackerbox homes and strip malls were just grafted onto it.
But hey... the homes were affordable! At least, by 2005 standards.
Now there's an 11 YEAR supply of homes on the market in Maricopa, according to a local realtor. I don't want to think what that place will look like if the residents start jingle mailing, it could turn into a 21st century ghost town.
We bought just before the early 80s bust, and the subdivision wasn't finished for years.
We used to shoot model rockets over the empty lots.
My son loved to climb over the unused fill mountains, and there was empty land he called "the weeds" to explore. He is 27 now. When he got to be about 9 the subdivision filled up. No more rockets. But at least he had the experience.
I think the US gov't is worried about $200/bbl oil
Damn straight. The military is gung-ho on certifying all of their equipment on alternative fuels, plus actively developing new suppliers of same.
p.s.: Thank heaven TPTB have resisted calls to open up the SPR every time prices spike. The idiots suggesting we use it don't seem to understand what the "S" really means.
The Aldrich Plan is the Wall Street Plan. It means another panic, if necessary, to intimidate the people. Aldrich, paid by the government to represent the people, proposes a plan for the trusts instead." - The Aldrich Plan (History of central banking in the United States) was a forerunner to that which spawned the Federal Reserve.
"To cause high prices, all the Federal Reserve Board will do will be to lower the rediscount rate..., producing an expansion of credit and a rising stock market; then when ... business men are adjusted to these conditions, it can check ... prosperity in mid career by arbitrarily raising the rate of interest. It can cause the pendulum of a rising and falling market to swing gently back and forth by slight changes in the discount rate, or cause violent fluctuations by a greater rate variation and in either case it will possess inside information as to financial conditions and advance knowledge of the coming change, either up or down. This is the strangest, most dangerous advantage ever placed in the hands of a special privilege class by any Government that ever existed. The system is private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people's money. They know in advance when to create panics to their advantage, They also know when to stop panic. Inflation and deflation work equally well for them when they control finance."
"The financial system [...] has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board. That board administers the finance system by authority of [...] a purely profiteering group. The system is private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people's money."
The reason why "stated income" loans originated was because the lenders said it was "to streamline the process". Because some folks "didn't want to go thru the hassle of getting together all their paperwork". It was never meant (according to the lenders) to be what it became: An opportunity to lie about your income so you can qualify, LIAR LOANS!
Karl Denninger's idea is on to something. If you are stating INACCURATE income on the 1003 (mortgage application) you are either:
Commiting Bank Fraud, or
Cheating on your taxes
Either way, you are breaking the law. I say, Find them.
If you can't afford your home, then your lies are costing the taxpayers.
If you are paying your loan, but are reporting less than you actually make, then your lies are costing the rest of us to pay more in taxes.
Either way, find the liars! It's time to grow up. If you don't like obeying the laws, go move to another country.
FTR grew up in a mini-ranch development in Northern Colorado. 10 minutes to nearest store, 20 to nearest anything else, 30 minutes to school (but the bus took 60). No videogames or cable TV, either. Didn't stop us from having FUN as kids.
Since when was "things to do" determined by proximity to commercial enterprises?
"But is agricultural land really a good long-term investment?"
My Dad used to say that once in every generation farmers had a chance to make money. Right now ethanol is handing that chance to them in the upper Midwest.
My hub used nitrogen tri iodide to weld a street car to the tracks.
Lawyerliz, Nitrogen tri iodide is an unstable explosive. So unstable I never used it as a detonator. And I never heard of anyone using it for spot welding. Did it really work?
I agree with you. I actually think that $200 oil is not beyond belief for several reasons.
I'm starting to think it could go either way, basically that we're approaching some kind of tipping point.
The markets are getting so out of touch with reality -- stocks rising as earnings decline, commodities skyrocketing as economies slow -- that rational market participants have been penalized to the extent that they're approaching the point of complete loss of faith in the markets or maybe just personal bankruptcy.
Basically it becomes a case of extreme adverse selection which drives all the people out of the markets that makes markets stable and leaves only the madmen standing (again, this is all consistent with historical market debacles).
I think when it becomes apparent that the markets have completely decoupled from the economy and sane people feel that they no longer have any grasp on where the financial markets are heading, you set yourself up for a real panic (which we haven't had yet) -- at that point no sane person will willingly hold financial assests.
I think in our case that would likely manifest in a run on the dollar despite manifest deflationary pressures. So I wouldn't rule out a panic that sends oil to $200 while wages and house prices fall.
Perpetuating a policy of decoupling the financial system from the economy because recoupling is too painful I think is going to bring us to a breaking point where sensible participants will no longer have anything to do with the financial system at all for having seen it betray reason one too many times.
Implicitly I've always believed that there's been some salvation awaiting the dollar at the end of the day.
For the first time I'm genuinely starting to consider that's not going to be the case.
Extraction costs could be very high in today's environment. It was estimtated in the $20 to $40 range in the 90s with much higher costs today.
As you mention, drilling equipment and day rates have gone through the roof in recent years. More production won't happen even where available unless prices at these levels can be maintained.
I think in our case that would likely manifest in a run on the dollar despite manifest deflationary pressures. So I wouldn't rule out a panic that sends oil to $200 while wages and house prices fall.
We're already on that road!
As we've discussed previously, there's nothing that precludes domestic deflation coupled with a continued USD devaluation vs. foreign currencies.
As we've discussed previously, there's nothing that precludes domestic deflation coupled with a continued USD devaluation vs. foreign currencies.
What I'm getting at is that it might happen even though it makes no sense from a fundamental perspective.
In other words, bubbles cut both ways and at the endgame may be that the most rational market participants that have always formed the market's foundation may finally cave under the weight of self doubt.
Maybe the dollar really is worthless. Maybe oil really should cost $200/bbl.
Nothing else has made any sense.
The world is broken and it's not going to get fixed. Time to stop fighting and let it go.
He's a friend of a friend. He's started a couple of other businesses from a small idea. Working out a small shop near home sounds better than my 6AM flight tomorrow.
My Dad used to say that once in every generation farmers had a chance to make money. Right now ethanol is handing that chance to them in the upper Midwest.
wally | 04.06.08 - 7:00 pm | #
Your dad was right - except it isn't the commodity prices NOW that were that make the 'right time' it was buying land in the mid-1980s when good Midwest farm land was going for $400-$800 an acre... THAT was the one time in 'our generation' where farmers could lock in a cost structure where it would be possible to make money almost every year going forward...
At those land prices you can make money at $2 corn just about every year. At today's commodity prices $400-800/acre land almost prints money.
BTW - those 'depressed' land prices stayed that way for quite a few years. It was right after the farm crisis and you couldn't give land away. Anyone half awake could have bought the land then.
And 'ya' I looked but was as asleep as everyone else.
Your dad was right - except it isn't the commodity prices NOW that were that make the 'right time' it was buying land in the mid-1980s when good Midwest farm land was going for $400-$800 an acre... THAT was the one time in 'our generation' where farmers could lock in a cost structure where it would be possible to make money almost every year going forward...
I'm fond of telling people that when the time to buy real estate is right, you'll know it because you won't have any money to buy real estate.
Each of the participants in the FOMC meeting--including the Federal Reserve Board members and all the Reserve Bank presidents--will, as in the past, provide projections for the growth of real gross domestic product (GDP), the unemployment rate, and core inflation (that is, inflation excluding the prices of food and energy items). In addition, participants will now provide their projections for overall inflation. Both overall and core inflation will continue to be based on the price index for personal consumption expenditures (PCE).5
5: Participants will no longer provide projections for the growth of nominal GDP. These now seem relatively less useful to the public, given participants' projections for real GDP growth and overall inflation.
See also: "birth death" model to "estimate" job creation; BLS admits it is faulty in transition periods.
Also see; Wages adjusted for inflation.
To wit: The increase in real GDP in the fourth quarter primarily reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), exports, nonresidential structures, state and local government spending, and equipment and software that were largely offset by negative contributions from private inventory investment and residential fixed investment. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, decreased.
The deceleration in real GDP growth in the fourth quarter primarily reflected a downturn in inventory investment and decelerations in exports, in federal government spending, and in PCE that were partly offset by a downturn in imports.
Inflation: In January the core PCE index rose 2.5 percent y/y, well above the Feds
target rate of one to two percent. Inflation in the New York Area continues to trail the
nation.The January headline and core inflation rates were 3.7 and 2.1 percent.
Baron--never met an underwriter who wasn't super smart. They don't like you because you have to say no sometimes. And with super knowledge of real estate law.
Yes, the hub did use nitrogen tri. And it worked. While he and his buddy rolled around hidden behind a bush, laughing hysterically, they send for a welder and unwelded it.
He also has a story of pouring small bits of it out and watching the tiny explosions as it dried.
He blew up his dad's alarm clock, which made his dad mad. I don't know if he ever told his parents until their dying day about the street car.
Someone up-post mentioned the rise of social (computer) networking, and that's what I've heard also - this generation is finding, making, and maintaining friends online.
Yah, spending all your free time in front of a computer screen, how weird is that? As I surf the internet for hours and hours I wonder about the idea of "virtual friends". Don't those teenagers have anything better to do? Isn't that crazy? I don't mean you guys, you guys are all cool, I mean those other people.
I'm fond of telling people that when the time to buy real estate is right, you'll know it because you won't have any money to buy real estate. - ac
LOL. That was how it was with farm land back then. Back in mid-late 1980s corn was selling for UNDER a dollar at the rural elevators. The gov't would send a subsidy check almost equal to that called a 'deficiency payment' to raise the effective subsidized price to about $2/bu. In effect farmers back then were getting HALF their revenue and as a result almost ALL their profit from Washington.
You had to be might visionary to foresee a time where that would reverse... plus have the resources to stick it out. I almost jumped in but bailed out at the last minute... had cash to buy the land but didn't have enough to support me for long after that. I have mixed emotions about not doing it... I would be 'rich' now... if I didn't go broke then. About 50:50 odds either way... with wife & three kids I really wasn't in the mood to gamble.
Check it out with your friend and tell me if I'm right or wrong.
rich | 04.06.08 - 7:47 pm | #
Might be - but I doubt it. The reverse is MORE likely to be true - do the assembly in Mexico or Asia if at all. If they aren't doing the assembly offshore there is little reason to do the parts there.
I run into small mfgrs like the one lama pointed to all over - most do NOT offshore, labor cost saving not worth the hassle.
However once the owner cashes out by selling the company to a huge MNC who has people already on the ground in China & existing contacts THEN they offshore big time... ramp up production & quit selling via independent 'boutique outlet channels' and instead starts calling on the buyers in Bentonville AR. The death spiral isn't far behind...
When was the last sustained period of declining housing prices? My guess is that it was in the early 1930s. Anyone who bought a house after about 1933 has come out ahead barring contingencies. Is it any surprise that "get a house" became a piece of economic and cultural dogma?
Of course, not everyone could get a house. If you lacked the income, you could drive until you qualified, but otherwise you were renting. The game changed in the 2000s with:
extremely low interest rates provided by Greenspan as cover for Bush's bogus fiscal plan
regularization of unverified income loans originally designed for the self employed, but extended for general and often fraudulent use
development of the mortgage initiation industry, which started in the 90s, and provided a strong incentive to close
acceptance of securitized mortgage instruments as collateral for other more exotic and hard to audit financial paper
So, we have a financial sure thing combined with the means and motivation to let just about anyone join the fun. The result was completely predictable.
Right now, it appears that commodities are on a tear. If we eliminate all those nasty rules about commodities trading, and make it easier for naive traders to leverage themselves, perhaps with an opt-out payroll deduction pla, we could get a brief period of amazing returns on corn speculation, followed by an impressive collapse.
Places like Maricopa are not all that much different from Levittown and the other potato farm developments of the 1950s. Culturally, they were hells of uniformity, repression and boredom back then, and they are today. How many baby boomers ran away from the conformity of the suburbs to the conformity of the city?
The difference was that the economic basis underlying Levittown was buoyed by the growing regional economy. The town is still there, though I gather there are few unmodified Levittown originals left. Maricopa was built on the margin of a development boom that has collapsed. The Levittowners had jobs that qualified them for their mortgages. The Maricopans didn't but the mortgage system let them lie about it. It wasn't the first time, and it won't be the last. Granted, it may take another 70 years.
On the plus side, my mother told me that of the neat things about the Great Depression in the 1930s was that she and her friends could always borrow a key to one of the vacant apartments in their building whenever they wanted a club house to play in. Now, those were the golden days.
Maricopa was built on the margin of a development boom that has collapsed.
Funny, that's exactly how I feel about the Obama campaign. I don't care about any of the candidates really -- America's coming political situation is not "contained" by these three schmucks any more than the economic meltdown is being "contained" by the central banks -- but Obama's candidacy in particular seems to rest upon a set of slightly stale assumptions, a sort of giddy feeling of sky's-the-limit well-being, that seems part and parcel of a "boom" zeitgeist... except the boom is in reality over.
It's the sort of zeitgeist that promises great but vague things, a sort of iCandidacy that is going to change the world forever just because it is so very very kewl.
The Obama phenomenon reminds me a lot of condos and malls that they keep inexplicably building in certain areas these days, even though it's clear they're never going to be occupied.
That "taco moderne" style for strip malls is also over-used around the vegas burbs. Ugh ugh ugly. You can drive for miles over parking lot speed bumps every 50 ft. alt.tarmac-the-world
OT: what does $1.7 million (the new average Manhattan apartment cost) buy you? barely more than 1 bedroom and 1500 sq ft:
So Mal, what's the alternative? McBush?!? Ralph the kook? Don't get me wrong, Barak is a flawed soul, and has many stances that drive me batty (He's OK with the Airbus contract is just the latest), but troops in Iraq for 100 years? Or how about Phil Gramm back in power (Or-shudder-Wendy Gramm)? Look, I've had enough, I'm literally turning into a "yellow dog" right about now.
Rich,
Dry is right. You have it backwards. Take a GoreTex jacket for example. Almost every one of them is "Made in China". Well, the GoreTex is produced in AZ. The rest of the fabric likely is US made as well. However, making a garment with GoreTex is manually intensive, so it's sewn together in China. Hence the tag.
Without asking I know that lighting is all made here. Cheap LED lights might be made in China, not those.
One more thing, you would never make a quality specialty item in China. I have a business acquaintance who lived in China for 2 years. His job? Just watching them to make sure they didn't cut corners. He told me they would use cheaper resins in extruded plastics; whatever; no matter how small the cost savings, just to save a couple of bucks. They didn't appear to care about ruining a business relationship. Not someone you'd have making a specialty product with your name on it.
No wonder Ive been deranged all these years, my parents didnt go sufficiently in debt for me. That extra bedroom MIGHT have mattered, but NO... THEY had to save.
Wait, I hear the voice again. Something about the guns... Gotta go.
I live in NYC, half a block south of Stuyvesant HS. Glenwood, Related, Rockrose et al didn't seem to have a problem with building in the neighborhood - and well they shouldn't. I'm grateful to pay rents that make my nose bleed - because the only dwellings that can be bought here start at $1100/foot.
No wonder those s**t for brains developers out in Arizona are losing money.
Our house was a 1950 Levitt, which consisted of a kitchen, living room (with the TV build into the stair case provided by Levitt) and two bedrooms. The attic was unfinished and instead of a garage, there was a carport.
Very typical. When my sister was born in 1961, my father re-financed (if that's what it was called in 1961) and torn off the roof and build a dormer with one large bedroom for me and my bother. The unfinished portion of the attic was not completed for several years.
At that time my father was a CPA working in New York, my mother was a R.N., but did not go back to work until my sister was in elementary school.
OK, I'll get to my point.
Just like you our summers were spent playing, bicycling and swimming. Levitt in his kindness and wisdom, build community pools for the buyers of his homes and deeded these pools and their surrounding parks to the local government to be used in perpetuity by residents of the homes he had built. To obtain the tag needed to be admitted to the pool, one had to present some bill that showed where you lived, if you lived in a Levitt house, you received a pool tag.
I know that there are many difficulties when manufacturing or producing in China today. However, this whole discussion reminds me of the discussions in the 1960s and 70s regarding Japan's or later Taiwan's abilities. These aren't issues any more...
I expect that within a few years or at the very latest the next decade all of this will have been not much more than wishful thinking.
I expect that within a few years or at the very latest the next decade all of this will have been not much more than wishful thinking.
RE | 04.06.08 - 9:23 pm | #
RE - when China gets to where Taiwan & Japan are today they won't be a problem - they won't be cheap anymore.
I don't mind seeing American companies lose their ass to Toyota - Toyota builds a fine product worldwide and charges a premium... you want to compete with them you better make good stuff.
I get pretty jazzed when places like China make crap, get away with it mostly because their CB buys down the currency... its like working for nothing isn't enough... they need their gov't to make sure its less than nothing (considering the hidden losses on 'our' paper they bought to hold their currency so low).
As per lama's point about Gortex - I see that all the time... export parts to China to assemble then ship back. THAT is changing - those component plants are going into China FAST... but their costs are rising even faster.
We will be able to make stuff here again once the currencies balance out & we wake up & start making stuff again. We'll either start doing that or go without a lot of the stuff kids in Maricopa expect.
One more thing, you would never make a quality specialty item in China. I have a business acquaintance who lived in China for 2 years. His job? Just watching them to make sure they didn't cut corners.
Cracks me up, in a weird sort of way, that China now manufactures our pharmaceuticals. Does that strike anyone strange besides me?
I dont think you are quite fair here. From my perspective, the Japanese have been the greatest currency manipulators for a long time under the guise of having a free floating currency.
I also think it is important to note that the U.S. encouraged countries openly to peg to the dollar when it was to its advantage. It was sold as providing stability to countries with less developed financial markets.
One cannot have it both ways and now the boomerang has returned.
Cracks me up, in a weird sort of way, that China now manufactures our pharmaceuticals. Does that strike anyone strange besides me?
Outsider | 04.06.08 - 9:52 pm | #
Making the pharmaceuticals isn't a lot different than making antifreeze or paint thinner - just a chemical process. Its the controls & monitoring & record keeping that makes it 'special'. Considering China's track record on this front it does seem a bit strange.
I dont think you are quite fair here. From my perspective, the Japanese have been the greatest currency manipulators for a long time under the guise of having a free floating currency.
I agree the Japanese still manipulate a lot but it was AFTER Plaza... if China gives us a Plaza then I might cut them some slack afterward to maintain stability. If they gave us Plaza I think RMB:USD would be something like 4:1. That was the sort of cut Plaza was. China's inflation rate problem would go away at those ratios pretty fast. Might even see deflation over there if they cut as much as Plaza as fast as Plaza - that might be too much too fast.
Give 'em credit - the Chinese learned from Plaza to move slow. Damned slow...
As far as the US asking for a peg - that was (1) quite a while ago (2) in conjunction w/ fallout from the 'Asian Contagion' circa 1997 where everyone benefited from stability... and (3)long past the time where it benefited anyone.
March 25, 1975. That's the DAY that innocence died when I was growing up. The Lyon sisters disappeared on their way home from Wheaton Plaza and were never heard from again. As with 9/11 we DO have to balance our fears however.
"... Speaking earlier this month to a joint congressional subcommittee on economic policy and international trade and finance, U.S. Republican Senator and Chairman of the Joint Economic Committee Connie Mack said that allowing Latin American countries to adopt the U.S. dollar as their official currency would help stabilize prices and raise U.S. living standards.
Other members of the committee also chimed in, praising the idea of different central governments abandoning their national currencies for the U.S. greenback.
Removing 'daunting' obstacles
Not only will adaptation of the dollar help benefit those countries whose currencies blow in whatever direction financial markets want them to, it will also help the U.S. by lowering business transaction costs and providing financial and political stability.
"Dollarization would remove one of the most daunting obstacles for the development of Latin American economies - their protracted instability and propensity to exchange-rate fluctuations," Manuel Hinds, a former minister of finance for El Salvador, testified to the subcommittee. ..."</i>
The U.S. was encouraging dollar pegs in South America as recently as 1999. Very recently!
That was almost a decade ago... the result of Rubin's work... a lot has happened in a decade, since Rubin was king. Dotbomb, 9/11, two wars, housing bubble and now the credit crunch. Holding a peg through all that? How do they think they can make it stick? Crazy to for us & them to even think it is possible let alone the smart thing to do.
Spent the day in church messing with kids, at soccer game for one kid while other kid played with smaller ones there and the third was doing "boy stuff" around the neighborhood with two buddies. Other parents were home and gave him my cell phone number in case he needed me - but stay out of the house.
I kinda want my kids to mess in treehouses and rummage through field and wood. As much as they require constant weeding - weeds being a lot of the crap that our society puts out there - they need to learn how to recover from their scraped knees on their own.
Crazy to for us & them to even think it is possible let alone the smart thing to do.
No I dont think they can. This is actually one of my biggest worries that it will come apart too quickly and trash the dollar with the world financial system in its wake.
I believe that the Chinese are still quite convinced that they made it through the Asian financial crisis so successfully because of their peg. I also believe that they feel, especially in light of the present instability, they need to hold onto the peg as tightly as they can in order to retain their hard fought stability. I believe they are fighting the last war but given Japans experience with Plaza and what happened to their neighbors in the late nineties, I fully understand.
Decisions to peg or not cannot be made that quickly especially in a country with limited experience with free markets and a highly vulnerable financial system. Nine years in that context is a short time. As we just found out, even so-called stable financial systems in highly developed countries can devolve quickly into extreme instability. Financially immature countries are even more susceptible to such events. This is why I cannot blame China for the peg especially not in light of the fact that they have allowed for continued appreciation in recent years.
However, given the statements by U.S. officials in Setsers blog, even the U.S. doesnt appear to want a depeg at this time by anybody of even small significance.
IMO this makes for even less stability in an already unstable world as it forces other economies into a worsening inflationary spiral at a time when their better judgment had finally told them otherwise. However, it also points out how unstable the system has become because of the U.S. CAD which I think should not be termed a savings glut but a consumption addiction.
I am now worried that we will see a forced depeg by a major player because of inflationary pressures when the mob is in the street and unfortunately not as a result of a new Plaza.
I believe they are fighting the last war but given Japans experience with Plaza and what happened to their neighbors in the late nineties, I fully understand.
I fully agree - Plaza was a mess exactly because so much water built up behind the dam. China - whether they think so or not - is repeating the same mistake, letting an awful lot of water build up behind the dam. If you are right that the mob forces the depegging it will one helluva flood.
CAD which I think should not be termed a savings glut but a consumption addiction.
Semantics - they are coupled like the ying-yang diagram - inseparable. You won't see one go away without the other - we stop spending & they have to stop saving & vice versa.
However, given the statements by U.S. officials in Setsers blog, even the U.S. doesnt appear to want a depeg at this time by anybody of even small significance.
Ya - I know. Our team fears deflation and if the Chinese stop sending us 'money supply' where else can it come from? I don't see the Chinese stopping their manipulation of the yuan - but I would not be surprised if they unpegged. Allow for a de facto Plaza solution. Slower than Plaza but faster than the yuan appreciation has been up until now.
BTW - I compete with Chinese mfgrs... they are nowhere near as competitive as they were just a year ago... rebalancing is well on its way whether we really want it or not. I don't see any going back either.
first...
I read that article too and came away with a lot of the same feelings. It's a pretty lousy thing to do to your teenagers to drag them away from their familiar friends, schools and neighborhoods and plop them down in such a god-forsaken place.
And anecdotally, this "just walk away" business seems to be overblown. The people interviewed in the article seemed to be doing everything they could to hold onto their houses, at extreme financial sacrifice.
Maricopa is just one of the many kinds of hell we seem to be able to build for ourselves.
Maricopa seems to be the home of people who are unable to manage relationships. There is nothing more pathetic than a divorced Dad in his 40's buying a stucco palace he can't afford to impress his teens. No material compensate a kid for his self centered parents getting a divorce!
For some reason, these teenagers don't seem sufficiently grateful to have been saved from the horrors of urban life--YMCAs, corner stores, malls, sidewalks, high schools--and plopped into a community with a big golf course, no business district, and no social activities that don't require a driver's license, a car, gas, and 45 minutes of travel time.
No golf course, but that sounds remarkably like the place where I live. The kids, however, seem to create their own entertainment... mail box bashing is a biggie this time of year. One they hit high school age, most of them get handed a pick up truck (tho not a new one). First thing they do is slap glass-packs on the exhaust.
Darn kids these days.
I hate to get all nostalgic and everything, but I grew up in a small town that didn't have a mall until I was middle-school age, and as it was built on the edge near the highway it required driving (there was certainly no public transportation). It would have struck us as weird to hang out at a mall, anyway.
We rode our bikes everywhere. I remember us neighborhood kids having one glorious summer when a motel was being built near us. We played all evening in the construction site, where your basic low-equipment childhood games (hide & seek, various forms of fort-building) could flourish. It was, of course, "dangerous," and these days our parents would no doubt be sent to prison for allowing it. At least during the summer days we could ride our bikes to the library, the public pool, or a park.
In any case I refuse to believe this business about how all this suburban home-buying is "for raising kids." It seems to be for having them safe and sound until they hit puberty, and then making sure the little buggers find some way to raise themselves, either in the "media room" of the splendiferous house or at the supermarket. I have no particular objection to teenagers raising themselves in a lot of respects--Lord knows these hovering overprotective parents aren't doing them any favors--but they seem to be located in a place where the only way they can do so is to behave exactly the way their parents assumed they wouldn't: get a job at 16, eating into that precious "study time," just so they wouldn't go bonkers inside those big "family-friendly" houses.
Teenagers are supposed to be a nuisance; it's their job. What an odd world it is in Maricopa, where the kids do useful labor (bagging groceries) and the parents are all real estate brokers.
George C - Yeah, they all seemed to be running away from something. The impression I got was well-meaning people who just didn't seem to be able to cope with the world too well.
The guy who bought the house after his divorce "because he had watched his dad rent after his divorce and fritter his money away" - he's probably spent his whole life following his dad's footsteps - cigarettes, early, thoughtless marriage, divorce, moving around looking for something (even he's not sure what), then financial armaggedon. The rocker on the front porch of the roadside rest home is about all he really has to look forward to.
I also noticed in the article that they have these artificial lakes used to maintain green lawns (and that golf course), but no pool for the kids.
Whatever.
Yes, artificial lakes in the middle of the desert - definitely thinking about the kids on that one. In more ways than one.
/sarcasm
Don't blame the kids, you raised them yourself.
How come people look to others to organise a sence of community? Being independent asks for a responsibility to form the community yourself with the people present. This will also be a good lesson to teenagers, showing them an alternative to smashing mail-boxes.
I got the impression that there was no desire to live in Maricopa other than to buy a cheap, more affordable house. My guess is that most didn't buy to live there, but as a stepping stone to the huge mansion in Town.
(in my neck of the woods, Fry's isn't a supermarket, but a huge electronic and appliance store, like a Best Buy on steroids (thus the TV's, Video Games Etc...as if it matters)
he's probably spent his whole life following his dad's footsteps - cigarettes, early, thoughtless marriage, divorce, moving around looking for something
So, basically, he wasn't middle-class enough for a shot at the middle-class?
My response to the story was it sounded like the developers built for failure, abetted by a careless belief on everyone's part that local government is an unnecessary hindrance.
Yet we zero in on this guy's failed marriage, as if that's the real issue?
On the whole, I don't think anyone here is blaming the kids. The ones in Maricopa sound like a pretty good lot. It's the adults who seem to have some issues...
Fry's may be the big box electronics store. Its a cross between Best Buy & an old fashion electronic store where you buy parts to built/repair your own radio, robots, solar power station....
Maricopa is like the companies at the tail end of the Dotcom bubble...ie. companies not made to fill a demand for the products they sell, but made to be able to sell it's stock.
Maricopa was not built to supply the need to LIVE somewhere, but the need to OWN a home and make money. All the little details like, what are you and your kids gonna do while you wait for your house to earn your retirement, were beside the point.
Not really blaming the divorce, just saying that a lot of these problems seem to repeat generation to generation. And I agree that if we are allocating blame, the greatest part of it goes to the developers. But to me, there is a human interest story here. The developers can only make these kinds of messes if individuals have some kind of motivation to participate, and I'm trying to figure out the motivations.
I've been thinking about this for a while. Do we protect our children too much? I sometimes wonder if we're failing in our responsibility to "thin the heard" a bit. Perhaps our overprotection is allowing some of the weaker offspring to survive longer than they should. Take bicycle helmets. If a kid is too dumb to stay out of the street, putting a helmet on him just allows him to survive a battle of strength with a car, graduate to the next stage of life, and make other dumb choices that impact others, like planning a development without a high school.
To quote professor Linneman, "I'm only half-kidding."
In some ways children are over protected now , so we have soccer games to go to instead of working in the fields or riding bikes all over the place.
The world is the same now as then.
It's perfectly safe, until it isn't.
It is just that now you have been warned.
If anything bad happens, not only did something bad happen, but now you could have and should have known better.
What I guess I'm trying to say is that buying a house in this community was held out to people who are barely middle-class or struggling to enter it as a way to "raise your kids in the same safety and comfort" as the middle-class suburbanites do. These were, in the beginning, fairly modestly-priced suburban homes, and clearly the pitch was to "young families."
Yet all these folks found when they got there was suburban vacuity, in more ways than one.
Did I not make it clear enough for some people that "blaming the kids" was the furthest thing from my mind? I thought they were the most likeable people in the whole article. Precisely because they are trying to use the only real option the town gives them--working at the grocery part-time--to create some meaningful social space. They are refusing to stay isolated in the big media room and watch the big TV, and I think that's grand. Kudos to the proprietor of Fry's for not doing what so many suburban businesses in my neck of the woods do: practically declare war on teenagers because they don't want them "loitering" around and making the shoppers feel . . . threatened. Everybody came here to feel safe, you know. Better hide those sinister teenagers.
But they are having to fight against a community that was sold to their parents as "ready-made for raising kids." That's the part that is so mind-blowing.
Good Morning, Tanta. You're in fine fettle, I see.
one developer told her hed rather build a jail on his property than a high school
Defies rational commentary.
ended up with a fondue-fork wielding crowd after her for "child abuse."
Dee-licious!!!
We grew up in the same era, Tanta, although my setting was urban. Walked, bicycled, and stayed as far out of adult clutches as much as possible. (We played along the railroad tracks and under the bridges; specifically, on the catwalks.)
Youts of today would probably have a hard time believing that back-in-the-day any adult could haul off any kid anywhere any time for any reason to the nearest cop. That is, if the adult didn't actually slap you silly himself.
Voicing my objections to the status quo to my father (who was considerably more mild-mannered than the run of the mill,) he told me, "Little people are for big people to pick on. One day you'll be big people too."
What's bizarre about this story is that - where the kids are concerned - it recalls a 1970's movie called "Over the Edge," which was about the social lives of teens stuck in some godforsaken new exurban community somewhere in the New Mexico desert. For the kids, it's either hanging out at the local (underequipped) rec center, or going the vandalism, sex and drugs route. (One memorable scene had the hero and his girlfriend spending the night in a half-constructed house.)
Eventually, a group of these kids goes ballistic, manages to lock all the adults in the high school, and completely trashes the building (a sort of benign anticipation of Columbine, I guess).
I read this story and recalled the movie, and I couldn't believe that after 30 years this sort of adolescent hell is still playing out for some American kids.
I am shocked, shocked I tell you to discover that inattentive politicians, greedy developers and bureaucratic planners could collude to produce dysfunctional urban places.
The root of the word monotony is 'mono.' Maricopa is 92% SFRs and 96% white. Do you need any mayonaise with your cottage cheese, saltines and milk? Bad urban planning is not limited to inner city projects but at the same time don't whitewash exurbia because of these extreme examples.
They "pitched" these neighborhoods as places to raise kids because that is what the brochure should say to sell houses.
Many who bought there never envisioned actually having to stay their and "raise" their kids. If they cared about those things, it was likely as much for the resale value as anything. Like single people buying 3-4 bedroom homes because they had better resale. Nevermind that the home didn't fit their use needs, it fit their investment needs.
It's the same with any multi-level marketing. They hide themselves in businesses that actually sell products that people use, but you soon realize no one is doing the business of actually selling the products, they all are out trying to recuit people underneath them. The products are a front.
The "product" of a family friendly neighborhood was a front by the builders and buyers who felt it had to appear that way to be able to flip it on to the next level of poeple who presumably would buy because they actually wanted to live there.
One more thing about "Over the Edge" - it actually took a highly sympathetic view toward the kids, in a way that 1950's movies didn't. The last scene of the movie shows the hero on a bus going off to the reformatory. He looks out the window and sees his girlfriend and some of his buddies waving to him. The implication being, "We'll be here waiting for you when you get back." In other words, it was a celebration of the community that the kids had managed to eke out (even though the worst troublemaker of their group had been shot dead by the cops). There was really no sense that the adults in the film offered any hope or answers for the kids, and that there would be much meaningful change in the exurb.
The movie was so controversial that it was never shown theatrically and only turned up on HBO later. It was based on a real life event somewhere in California.
Oh and ONE MORE THING... when are people going to get it through their heads that desert communities cannot sustainably support large populations forever. Small populations maybe; large ones, no. What we're seeing here with these dying exurbs in the desert is exactly what today's archaeologists see when they study the Anasazi or the Chaco people. "Gosh, where did they all go so suddenly?" Poor planning isn't an exclusive feature of our own generation...
Really, anyone who buys an expensive house in the middle of the desert is pretty much stupid by definition to begin with.
Many who bought there never envisioned actually having to stay their and "raise" their kids. If they cared about those things, it was likely as much for the resale value as anything. Like single people buying 3-4 bedroom homes because they had better resale. Nevermind that the home didn't fit their use needs, it fit their investment needs.
I just don't get your mindset here.
Getting into the middle class is supposed to be about having both "the place to raise the kids" and a wealth-building asset. Jeebus, surely that's the point? Working-class people have always found perfectly acceptable shelter in which they could raise kids. But they weren't "owning" anything that would improve their kids' standard of living in the future.
I brought up the subway story because it seems so clear to me that there are powerful forces in this culture militating against people who choose to focus on "raising the kids" in an environment (NYC) in which homeownership is more an exception and public transportation the only practical option. In other words, in the world our media seems to live in, you simply can't do a good job raising kids without also buying into the buying into story.
Surely we could with little effort Google up some stories implying that people who focus only on their kids' childhood experiences, without "taking thought" for their retirement needs and the "wealth-building effects" of homeownership are "really" the bad parents.
I do find it odd that we want to assign everyone only one single motive or concern. Somehow I tend to think of people as rather more complex than that.
The Anasazi likely got wiped out with a triple threat. First a long drought, then a disease vector and then neighboring civilizations finished them off. They overdeveloped, over densified and pissed off the neighbors with those acts.
OT, but apropos - we need and value Tanta and CR, let's not stress them out too badly - I know I am as guilty as any.
In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop
In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop - NY Times
But they are having to fight against a community that was sold to their parents as "ready-made for raising kids." That's the part that is so mind-blowing.
Sigh. Deep sigh.
Why did the adults (with or without kids) buy there ? Economics was certainly part of the decision. I'm betting peer pressure had a bit to do with it as well ("my sister can afford a nice house, why can't we ?"). The list of possible reasons could go on and on. To ask someone who has a kindergarten age child (or children) to think that far ahead (call it 10 years ?) might be asking a bit much. At best, they would have been concerned about K-6 schools. Beyond that, they could up-flip to a neighborhood with better high schools.
Until now, where they are stuck (if lucky) or dealing with imminent FC.
School board needs to turn to the state (hat in hand) and ask for help (not that the state could do much these days).
I was born very near Maricopa, back in the 50s. Phoenix of my youth was largely a farm town. Now, it'll be the largest desert ghost town until Dubai runs out of petrodollars in 50 years.
I've always considered Phoenix 'Exhibit A' for naked capitalism... let developers do anything they want, and let's see what you get.
There used to be scores of orange groves, and Japanese flower farms down on Baseline Road, in far South Phoenix. Every one of them was razed for a 'Taco Moderne' stucco development.
Now I live in Oregon, and am thankful every day I can raise my kids here.
In Web World of 24/7 Stress, Writers Blog Till They Drop
Oh fer chrissakes. Now blogging is gonna give me a heart attack?
Will these people ever stop finding yet more ways for us to fear our lives?
Bloggers, like everyone else, can die. NO. REALLY? SOMEBODY CALL THE TIMES!
I was thinking, oh, Fry's the computer store? but it really is just a supermarket?
Youtube for this article:
YouTube -
(A drive in Maricopa, AZ .. slit your wrists as well).
The Times is scared of bloggers Tanta. The real heart attacks are in the decimated city rooms and editorial boards. They should start blogs to give themselves an outlet. I feel better just imagining the comments section Gretchen would have.
Until kids are old enough to drive, it is the parents responsibility to "entertain" them.
Its just not the way it was when I was a kid anymore. Back then, we rode bikes miles away from home, built rafts on lakes, dug caves, did all kinds of fun dangerous things.
Today I wont let my kids leave the yard by themselves. So every weekend is spent on kids activities, sports, etc. Thats just the way it has to be now. Theres always plenty to do, but it costs time and money. A lot of money. But the kids are the most important thing.
I'm betting peer pressure had a bit to do with it as well ("my sister can afford a nice house, why can't we ?").
I still think we're missing a whole other kind of "peer pressure." Namely: It is an unassailable truth of the universe that the best place to raise kids is in a "nice house." My sister "provided for" her kids. I should therefore "provide for" my kids, or else I'm a bad parent. I shouldn't leave them where they are, because they'll get in trouble hanging out at the Y or walking to the store. Every time I pick up a newspaper or flip on the TV I see wall-to-wall coverage of missing kids and the horrors of Drugs and so on.
You are telling me this wasn't/isn't a profoundly common way to think?
Of course the people who bought in Maricopa figured a high school would be built when needed. I doubt many people these days have a lot of prior experience with ungoverned localities with absolutely no planning and no process for citizens to set priorities. And the RE community did exactly nothing to help them understand the risks of that.
"Over the Edge" - Matt Dillon's feature film debut.
Re: Fry's - Like others I did a double take on that too and I checked - http://www.frysfood.com/homepage/index.htm
There really IS a food chain by that name. ( OT, and btw, the Fry's Electronics in Phoenix unfortunately did NOT live up to its well deserved reputation for appalling service but did still have the huge range of geeky stuff at great prices when I shopped there in Oct 2006 ).
I found this in the article scary and amusing too:
He took a shine to a planned community called Anthem, about 30 miles north of Phoenix,...Fox found he was able to get more house for less money in Maricopa.."
He LIKED Anthem ? And regards Maricopa as more downmarket than that ? Sheesh. I made a point of driving around Anthem for 30 minutes on my out to Prescott ( yeah, I know what that implies classwise ) - it was gawdawful. Dread to think what Maricopa is like - but the writer has painted a great portrait.
Also, this struck me:
...and Fox put 15 percent down, his life savings. From Chase Bank, he got a so-called 2/28 adjustable-rate mortgage, which meant that for the first two years he would pay 7.5 percent interest..
With 15% down he ought to have got a much better deal surely ? Did he get put into a subprime unnecessarily by some swindling shit ?
Great article - I'll have to visit that Fry's next time I'm going down that way towards Tombstone..
-K
Bloomies, Lex and the crosstown? Piece 'o cake.
Don't get me started on the trustafarian scorecard-wielding professional moms of Billyburg. Pffft.
I doubt many people these days have a lot of prior experience with ungoverned localities with absolutely no planning and no process for citizens to set priorities. And the RE community did exactly nothing to help them understand the risks of that.
Tanta, to a large degree you have this backwards. Maricopa is the product of too much planning and not enough organic growth. Use google maps and look at the patterns. Then zoom in at look at the waste of space for the function(s) anticipated. These are recent communities. If anything they suffer under the yoke of overheavy planning.
Thanks for memory lane, Justin... that's what MOST of the Phoenix area looks like, now. The wealthier middle class areas have slightly nicer malls, slightly more natural landscaping. You can tell when you're in a nicer area.. the mall parking lots don't have oil stains in the parking spaces, and there aren't check cashers.
But they all have the same horrific blandness about them... tan stucco, surface streets larger than most state highways... it's the suburban nightmare Jim Kunstler writes about all the time in his 'clusterF@ck nation' blog, every monday.
God, I'm so glad I'm here in Oregon, skirting a heart attack, blogging, instead.
Today I wont let my kids leave the yard by themselves.
You must be like a lot of my neighbors. I live in a very kid-friendly neighborhood--even the apartments in my complex are at least two and mostly three bedroom, designed for families. Sidewalks on both sides, a park, play areas.
And yet, on the weekends and the early evenings, I have the whole place to myself. Except for one elderly man who lives a few blocks down and a couple of dog-walkers, I toddle along on my walks on vast vistas of uninhabited sidewalks. What, exactly, is the "threat" these kids have been permanently grounded to protect them from? Me?
Good lord, even back when I weighed 100 pounds soaking wet and leaned on a cane for my walks, I never felt threatened on the half-mile trip down to the corner store. (Actually, I'd put up with at least one and sometimes two cars pulling over, their anxious drivers asking if I needed a ride.)
So the dogs can't run loose because they might bite the kids who can't run loose, and all of this is because there's some threat lurking here that I, a single woman living alone who is actually more than typically observant, can't discern.
Whatever.
In rural Nebraska, we had to cut holes in our pockets to find something to play with.
I turned out OK, but I do buy my slacks with the long, loose pockets now.
Oh fer chrissakes. Now blogging is gonna give me a heart attack?
The worst part is some clown probably got a government grant to do the study.
The one thing missing in the article is what this guy was making. $212M house w/ 15% down is probably better than the vast majority of purchases in the last three years. If a common worker cannot afford a $200M mortgage, how are we going to reduce inventory of homes, raise interest rates to sensible levels, etc.?
What, exactly, is the "threat" these kids have been permanently grounded to protect them from?
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/cvus9903.pdf
Table 52. Personal crimes, 1999:
Victimization rates for persons age 12 and over,
by type of crime and locality of residence of victims
Rates per 1,000 persons age 12 and over
Type of crime areas Urban Suburban Rural
Personal Crimes 41.5 33.7 25.1
Crimes of violence 39.8 32.8 24.9
The "Urban" and "Suburban" totals are further broken down based on
urban area size because the UCR conclusions as to the causes of crime was
not simple density but "population density and degree of
urbanization." The reason for this was
because there is no effective way to establish the independence of the
two variables based on the data being measured.
Sounds a lot like Levitt Town post WW dos.
Personal anecdote, couldn't help myself: I grew up in Manhattan riding buses by myself from the age of 6 (it was 1963). Once I did get my hair pulled by some kids, but mostly I was fussed over by old ladies. I was terrified of the subway until I was grown.
One of my brothers is raising his kids in the suburbs of a big middle-America city where you can't walk anywhere which I find horrifying, but the kids are pretty much the only interesting people around.
Don't blame the kids, you raised them yourself.
In honor of the teenagers of Maricopa, Arizona... some Sunday Rock Blogging:
YouTube -
Rob, I think of "planning" as more than subdivision street layout.
There is no "overheavy planning" in a community that fears building a new high school in case it lowers property values, or has only one route to the nearest job center that is crossed by a freight railroad line with no overpass. Did you catch that part? All those commuters on the only highway access to their jobs, sitting at a crossing waiting for some creeping freight train to pass 60 times a day?
Namely: It is an unassailable truth of the universe that the best place to raise kids is in a "nice house."
errr... I disagree. The best way to raise kids is to pay attention and to raise kids. The welfare of the kids should come first, and the bling-value of the house or neighborhood should follow. This could easily deteriorate into a good-neighborhood/bad-neighborhood discussion tho. What I was trying to get my thoughts around, was the concept of materialism as a key objective. IOW, people who bought homes on the concept of 'niceeeee' instead of "what are amenities and support structure of the neighborhood".
I know many people (some of my neighbors even) who are raising kids quite well, while living in single-wide or double-wide MH's. They live in rural settings on larger tracts of acreage. The kids get on the school bus every morning and return home the same way in the afternoon. When the kids become teens, they'll ride a different bus to a different school.
This is a difficult concept to verbalize (in print no less), but the parenting skills should come first. Just because you live in a 'nice house' does not automatically make you the 'best parent' possible.
This is beginning to go way OT tho.
A number of members [Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates] of the Gulf Cooperation Council aim to introduce a single currency by 2010.
Some Gulf council members aim for single currency in '10: Reuters - MarketWatch
Rob:
The city wasn't incorporated until 2003.. during the housing boom.
Who do you imagine did Maricopa's planning for them?
Let's not make it a bad government story if there wasn't much of a government around.
The NYC subway is one of the safest places in the country until 9PM when it becomes one of the safest.
So, the idea is to move your kid to the nice safe Maricopa where there's no bad influences. Does anyone remember the movie "Over the Edge"?
Over the Edge (film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Rob, I'm getting to the point of having little use for "crime" statistics like that, since I'm getting to the point of wondering what some of these "crimes" were.
Having your hair pulled by a bunch of little berks on the bus? These days, that's felonious assault.
In a "zero tolerance" environment, there's precious little a lot of kids can do that isn't a "crime." Apparently there are people who think the subway mom is a "criminal," and her kid is the victim of a "crime."
So don't toss these statistics at me, please. I begin to be a bit suspicious of them.
And our government is giving these self-same developers a tax carryback?
Steven Pearlstein - Max and Chuck Show, Cont. - washingtonpost.com
If you haven't already, call your senators and demand they remove the tax benefits for builders and banks from the Forclosure Act.
The worst part is some clown probably got a government grant to do the study.
OK, I take it back. This gig may yet give me heart failure.
What "study?" You didn't read the article, or your ideology (government only wastes money with stupid grants) gets in the way of basic reading comprehension.
There is no "study." It's some reporter taking a couple of unrelated facts--people who were bloggers actually died from a disease that has a huge hereditary component--and turned it into a "trend." Or a possible trend we should be afraid of. It wasn't funded by the government, it was "funded" by the famous free market infotainment industry.
This is actually quite amusing as a comment on a thread about how the utter lack of a local government seems to have doomed a boom-town to failure.
Namely: It is an unassailable truth of the universe that the best place to raise kids is in a "nice house."
errr... I disagree.
I'm sure you do. So do I. I wasn't "endorsing" that point of view, I was pointing out that it's there and it's powerful.
You can move as far from the evil city as you want, but the fear will always follows as long as the media is programming you.
I knew a woman in San Jose whose fiv- and seven-year old children were not allowed to leave the yard without an adult. She lived in fear. In the safest neighborhood of about the safest big city in America.
On the other hand, I saw my friends' kids grow up in San Francisco with unlimited cheap access to the transit system -- which even could take them out of town -- and the result was a class of kids who knew how to handle themselves, by themselves, in any situation, by the time they were 14.
Moving out to the boonies here in Northern Cal is almost never to the benefit of the kids; it's for property appreciation. If the parents had the money, they'd stay close in and buy in a city with a stellar public school system like Palo Alto or Cupertino or good charter schools. Believe me, moving to a stark subdivision on the edge of the fields in Tracy -- or Maricopa -- is good for no one's children.
There is no "overheavy planning" in a community that fears building a new high school in case it lowers property values,
It was the developers that feared their property values would be decreased by providing for a high school and they are correct. It is only because of bad planning and a school board that can't say no that there is a problem. All the school board has to do is present a letter to the council stating they will no longer issue will serve letters until there is a secondary school plan in place. The claim that the superintendant has to beg is ludicrious. Same for any poormouth from the fire department, et al.
As to crime, the FBI since 1929 has identified density and degree of urbanization as the number one indicator of general and violent crime rates. I'm sorry you are tired of hearing it but there is no reason to be suspicious as to the veracity.
It is only because of bad planning and a school board that can't say no that there is a problem.
Did you actually read the article?
They didn't have a school board!
What is missing from the article is why can't this guy afford the house. He took a $212K mortgage which was fine when prices were going up. It does not say he lost his job or became disabled. So why does he face FC?
They also didn't have a mayor, a city council, planning department... actually, the first city employee hired was the City Manager, I think. I read that in the Arizona Republic a few years ago, since Maricopa did not and still does not have a local newspaper.
Check out their official website.. kind of interesting... they also had vandalism at their local city park, that shut off the water fountains. They recommend that people 'bring their own water' to the park. In a desert. It's that kind of hell hole.
401 Authorization Required
By the way, I believe the FBI statistic.. but it's basically saying (my guess), that where there are more people, there are more crimes.
Did you actually read the article?
They didn't have a school board!
From the article:
In 2005, the local school district appointed a superintendent, John Flores, who began pleading with the developers for space for a high school (for a while, Maricopa schools were admitting 300 new students every month). But it was to no avail. Amy Haberbosch, Maricopas former director of planning, told me that developers believed high schools lowered property values;
They had a board and a superintendent neither of whom had the huevos to say no to developers thus shortchanging the children with bad planning. So, yes I read the article. If you want to go back further then the board of supervisors acting in those functions were also guilty.
I grew up in a boring suburb, where you needed a car to do anything (which I didn't have and rarely had access to.)
Now that I'm older, most people think of me as a boring guy. Really makes sense, that.
"They had a board and a superintendent neither of whom had the huevos to say no to developers thus shortchanging the children with bad planning. So, yes I read the article. If you want to go back further then the board of supervisors acting in those functions were also guilty."
There's a lot to a situation like this. Sure, the board of supervisors is responsible. And...who helped them get elected? Did they get big money from the developers? Did it become clear locally that you couldn't get elected without developer money?
It's easy to blame individuals; but if one doesn't think that pouring huge money into a political system can't warp the outcome against the best interests of the community, one hasn't been reading the papers.
I don't know that this happened. But that's what I've seen happen with other communities that took on too much development. Take a small, poor community, tell the landowners they'll get rich, get the right people elected, and then build a hellhole of a community that can't sustain itself. And run off with your money.
Construction sites! Such blissful childhood memories go back to the years when the interstate widened from four lanes to twelve. First, they vacate the houses and you can break in and hide in them and wreck them. Then they bulldoze the houses and you can play postattack thermonuclear warzone games. You can play on the construction equipment too, of course. Then they cart away the rubble and bulldoze all the trees and you can play Tarzan - you'd be amazed how much acreage you can coverage with the flattened foliage of a few dozen trees. Then they strip the land and grade the roadbed, creating giant cliffs and dirt bombs which make awesome clouds of dust around your target's head. I wish the kids in these brand-new slums a wonderful childhood like that.
Come on, Rob. Even if you don't read the whole thing, I did quote these clues:
But at the beginning of Maricopas growth, the city was unincorporated, and all these negotiations were made by a three-person county board of supervisors that was working from rural zoning codes dating back to 1962.
By the time Maricopa became a city, though, almost half of its land was owned by developers.
Maricopa did not incorporate as a city until 2005. When it finally got a school superintendent. After the developers were already fully in control of almost half the real estate in the city.
Tanta - you reminded me of my youth during the summer. Riding our bikes from sun up to sun down(until the street lights came on). Or playing basketball or having dirt-clod wars. Almost no tee-vee was, as we didnt have cable
Maricopa incorporated in 2003 not 2005.
Ownership of real estate does not vest with development rights. It was the electeds and staff that screwed up the urban planning aspects that led to the magnitude of this disaster. Other boomburgs incorporated around the same time with similar circumstances with vastly different outcomes.
"IN THE EARLY 1990S, Maricopa was a small farming community with a population of about 600, mostly longtime farmers and Hispanic laborers, along with a few American Indians"
This is one of the last holdouts of the Monroe Doctrine. I knew we could find and ruin every last place on this continent.
Construction sites! Such blissful childhood memories..
and..
when a motel was being built near us. We played all evening in the construction site, where your basic low-equipment childhood games
You guys been incorporating ET movie sequences into your own half-remembered childhood ?
Not disputing - just that your comments remind me of those sequences.
-K
He took a $212K mortgage which was fine when prices were going up. It does not say he lost his job or became disabled. So why does he face FC?
Because since he bought that house, he remarried, which people have been known to do since the time of Henry VIII, and he and his wife don't need two houses. Plus that teaser-rate went away, which isn't helping any.
We need to stop ignoring the "immobility" problem. The people who really get stuck when they're underwater are those who have some good reason--marriage, jobs, family needs--to move, but now can't. The whole RE industrial complex spent a lot of the last several years nattering on about "putting down roots," but never mentioned the risk that you can't move when you need to.
For once, we get a story in the bleedin' NYT that isn't about a single individual with a "sympathy story," and we can't focus on the larger picture drawn. We can only keep going back, obsessively, to individuals and the "financial mismanagement" or even--help me, Rhonda--picking apart their marriages or divorces or fucking smoking looking for some "original sin" in these individuals that can "explain" the whole sorry mess.
The reason we'll never get a useful proposal for ways to mitigate the pain of a bust is that too many people are too invested in their own self-satisfaction and can't stop themselves from wondering what these people did to bring it all on themselves. We will make no progress until people examine that impulse.
Tanta,
You said,
"I just don't get your mindset here.
Getting into the middle class is supposed to be about having both "the place to raise the kids" and a wealth-building asset. Jeebus, surely that's the point?"
And then went on to say how I somehow ascribe a common motive to all buyers and that you see people as more complex. Yet you seem to know what everyone's "point" is, or their desire.
The fact is they bought here as an investment they also had to live in. And builders built here simply to sell houses, not because a community was needed. It didn't spring out of a growing demand but was placed there, a ready made community, like a movie set in Hollywood.
I dare say everyone robs a bank for the same motive, no matter the complexities of the individual. Sometimes you can ascribe common motives. In this case it's safe to say that the majority of people buying here did not have a desire to live out a peaceful life in Maricopa. They bought here to get on the property ladder so the house could save the downpayment for the house they REALLY wanted in the neighborhood they really wanted for the price they couldn't afford right now.
It was a gold rush. Their motives were as similar as the 49er's, to strike it rich. Yes people are complex. But when complex people all get the same idea at the same time you get what's called a "bubble".
You guys been incorporating ET movie sequences into your own half-remembered childhood ?
No, hon. For some of us there was childhood first, then movies about childhood.
I'd hate to have to tell you how old I was when "ET" came out, or how little it resembled the environment of my childhood.
Rob Dawg writes:
Ownership of real estate does not vest with development rights.
I am pretty sure that it does, or at least can, depending on the form of ownership.
Planning and zoning are reactionary forces to existing circumstances, or the presumption of existing circumstances.
The issue here isn't bad planning or bad development, both of which are in play here, but what drove the creation of these bedroom communities.
That, my dear Watson, is the question, and the answer lies with the homeowners.
The whole RE industrial complex spent a lot of the last several years nattering on about "putting down roots," but never mentioned the risk that you can't move when you need to.
Certainly this is another emerging theme of this crisis as those tender roots have become hard and fast anchors.
In this case it's safe to say that the majority of people buying here did not have a desire to live out a peaceful life in Maricopa.
The relitter and her buddies interviewed in the beginning of the article seem to have had no desire to stay in Maricopa.
But what makes you think that Adrianna's and Alajeda's parents thought that way?
I am merely making the point that people can want a lot of things at once, and can choose strategies that they think or hope will meet all their needs. I don't think you have to search to find their one and only one "real" motive.
Robbing banks is certainly an interesting comparison. That tends to be a behavior of those whose complex strategies have all failed, and who then drive themselves or are driven to a stunningly uncomplex strategy that almost never works.
We did not just spend the last five to ten years being deluged by media and "financial advisers" and advertisers and politicians of the "ownership society" sort encouraging us to think of buying homes as a single-motivation activity of the desperate. We were "sold" on it by people trying to tell us it would meet all our needs.
If we're going to go back and retroactively lump everyone who bought into that as a "criminal," then count me the hell out.
I think Maricopa should hire Jim Kunstler to be their new director of planning. He is bright and easy going and probably could help them more quickly move to their end game.
So, The New York Times sends another pith-helmeted writer out into the heart of flyover country to investigate the culture and lifestyle of what they regard as primitive inhabitants. Of course, the reporter finds ennui here. It's boring compared to Manhattan.
Boy arrested after girl stabbed dozens of times
Boy arrested after girl stabbed dozens of times | The San Diego Union-Tribune
Tanta,
You should volunteer for a police ride along sometime. The children this society is creating will really stand your hair on end. Businesses don't want kids around, and people don't want to live next to high schools, not because of the movies they see, but because of what these kids actually do. It doesn't grow out of some urban legend grounded in baseless fear. It grows out of rational self-preservation based upon real life events that happen to them.
Tanta - you reminded me of my youth during the summer. Riding our bikes from sun up to sun down(until the street lights came on). Or playing basketball or having dirt-clod wars. Almost no tee-vee was, as we didnt have cable
In my case it was often the little girl with glasses leaving the library and searching for a secluded spot to open her books, free from both the teevee noise and those rotten boys with their dirt-clod wars. We didn't always just look for ways to be with other kids in a social environment; at least some of us were looking for a way to get away from those "organized" and "structured" and adult-managed "activities" that can sap a poor kid's abilities to use her own imagination, thanks, instead of some adult's.
My sister was more into the basketball and dirt-clod thing.
...at least some of us were looking for a way to get away from those "organized" and "structured" and adult-managed "activities" that can sap a poor kid's abilities to use her own imagination, thanks, instead of some adult's.
Kids are geniuses at adaptive reuse, at least when given the tools.
Dryfly, Thanks for the Sunday Rock Blogging. I needed that - the sounds of my mispent youth.
You should volunteer for a police ride along sometime.
No, I'll stay home and blog where I can develop heart disease.
Oh well. It's good to finally find out what my neighbors are hiding their children inside their homes from: their children.
They have to be someone's children, these knife-wielding maniacs? Don't they? How can not living near a high school protect you from . . . your children? Don't they eventually have to come home for dinner and a place to sleep?
the heart of flyover country
Arizona?
It's boring compared to Manhattan
I was amused by the fact that one of the kids told her it was boring compared to Illinois. Which is rather closer to what I think of as "flyover" country.
Wow.
My fondest memories as a kid were of wondering around, miles away from any adults, in fields and piles of dirt, throwing rocks and trying to catch snakes and jumping in puddles....
But my own 5yr old daughter, I won't let into the front yard unsupervised.
I'd like to let her run around the neighborhood, ring the other kids doorbells by herself (like I did), but I'm afraid I'll get arrested for child abuse/neglect.
Not afraid for her; afraid for me.
Not afraid for her; afraid for me.
Now that's probably the first truly honest word I've heard on the subject this morning.
Irvine would be feeling pretty good about itself right now except for all the foreclosures.
I can almost hear Kunstler crowing.
Ringing door bells and running and hiding -what was that game called?
I am sure we would be arrested for that today.
"If we're going to go back and retroactively lump everyone who bought into that as a "criminal,"
Perhaps we are talking past each other.
I don't hear people claiming that the buyers were criminals, only that they, like those that enroll in MLM schemes, were one part of a two part scheme to make money and essentially forgot what the purpose was of buying a house and living in a community.
The Builders and buyers both wanted to set up a community of homes, not for the purpose of providing a place for people to actually live, but only as a vehicle for which to buy and sell houses like stocks of a dotcom company. The company is set up only so far as to appear to be a legit company based upon some legit business need, but then when you get down to the nitty gritty you realize all the true effort and design in making the company was only so that it would make the stock more desireable...if you talked to the founders you'd realize that all that was on their mind was to go public, running the actual business was a side-issue. And all the stock buyers bought not to own a piece of a good business but to buy a rising asset and sell it to someone else later. That is what Maricop was. A shell of a community built and bought soley as a means to an end...to make money.
I am not sure this makes anyone a criminal...it just means alot of people who had the same motive..to make money...all decides simultaneously that buying and selling houses was the best way to do it.
Limiting the damages of this is simply to stop the bubble in the first place, if possible.
Your call to arms to prevent the damage from a damage causing event reminds me of some of Vince Lombardi's old sayings...such as
"That place...nobody goes to that place anymore, it's too crowded".
Or, my own...."let's say we vandalize this place...but do it without causing damage."
Tanta,
The thread comments about overprotective parents is funny. We here in Palo Alto have an active wildlife. Last year a mountain lion was shot a mile from our house. The damn critters come down from the mountains looking for a quick snack and some cop kills them. This does make the local moms and dads a bit nervous. Not as nervous as the moms and dads in Los Altos Hills, Atherton or Woodside where they don't let their kids play in the backyard.
I took Google Earth Airlines down to Maricopa while reading this and looked around. Why in the hell did they build at that density when land prices had to be so cheap. This is old Arizona ag country. I flew about looking at the fields and orchards surounding Maricopa and saw old Arizona - big yards, no grass, lawn cars and lots of junk. Old Arizona is my kind of place.
I was born & raised in Tucson -- a child of the '50s. The desert where I used to ride my horse, play cowboy & Indian and build forts has been transformed into Taco-tacky Moderne big box stores, strip malls, medical centers, homes & townhouses, fancy gated communities, golf courses, etc. As a young adult, I lived & worked in Scottsdale/Phoenix.
Arizona sold its soul to the developer. Why am I not surprised my family & others now live in a developers' hell?
Kunstler is holding his powder dry. He'd like to go off one one of his snark attacks but for the uncomfortable issue that the cenurbs are seeing the same implosions. Wanna buy a downtown condo to lose weight, save money and the planet? Thought not.
Average Joe writes:
...reminds me of some of Vince Lombardi's old sayings...such as
"That place...nobody goes to that place anymore, it's too crowded".
fyi, that would have been Yogi Berra.
Kinda late to the party here, but have to comment on the kid's parenting stuff. Have 4 at home in an "exploding" small town in Central Tx. Our kids and the neighbors play outside and would be in the street more if my wife wasn't a "scaredy cat". Upthread many remark on how the kiddos need to learn on their own and by god, the problem with many parents and the nanny ( read a rant coming here, breathe!!) they won't until they get knocked down (not necessarily by a car) and get back up, over and over again.
Let them live or watch them struggle later OH yeah, watch it now!
I wonder if the "overprotective parents" meme is constant in all generations (the converse of "today's youth lack ambition and moral fiber")
My own father used to tell me how as a kid, he hiked around yosemite alone. Inside I thought, "how come you won't let ME do that?"
Sometimes I tell my daughter stories about life-when-I-was-a-kid. I'll bet she's thinking, "you bastard, how come you won't let ME do that?"
As someone who finds the suburban lifestyle anathema (I don't even have a drivers license), I can at least understand the parents impulse.
In my 20s I lived in places that were interesting, but questionable. When D.C. was the murder capital of the U.S., I lived in its zip code with the highest murder rate. There are times, like when there are a couple flipped over police cars burning within a couple blocks of your home, that you lose a fundamental sense of security.
I remember once when there was a random killer about, someone had been shotgunned in an alley a block up from ours. It was like 9pm on a summer night, just after dusk, and I got up to go mail a letter in the box on the corner and my (now) wife looked at me like I was insane and refused to let me leave the apartment.
I was young with no possessions. It would obviously be a lot different at 35, and with kids.
This is the top-of-fold front page story in Sunday's SF Chronicle:
Lenders retreat as housing market plummets
hey, there's a harrahs at ak-chin , just down the road.
plus, the kids could work in the onion and spinach fields. SO much
more than just fry's.
I think I know why kids find life "boring". They live in such a sterile environment today. I had a great childhood "rich" in play & colorful in experiences.
While were on the subject of Arizona. I have a question. I remember a few years ago, there was one of those perennial stories about water shortages in the west and it I seem to remember that Phoenix got most of their water from the ground and was draining the aquifer at some alarming rate.
Since then, their population has probably increased 30% and you don't hear anything about the water situation.
Did they find some secret source?
glen garry glen ross
was'nt alec the developer, i can just imagine him in a 'god speach' saying no to high schools.
Bob_in_MA
They built the canal down from the Colorado River some years ago. The interesting part of that is how, because they are using all of their water alotment, Southern California can't use it.
Mal, here is the trailer for "Over the Edge"
YouTube - Over The Edge (1979) trailer
That is a great movie
I tend to think that those who have fond memories of a carefree, worryfree childhood are naturally the ones who survived unscathed. I too remember leaving the house in the morning and being gone till dusk...all as a 2 or 3 grader.
Now with TV, internet etc, we all get to share in the terror experienced by the few.
It's kinda like the antelope in the field blissfully eating away as the lions pace back and forth taking off the weakest. It's only hell for those who don't live to tell about it.
Now we all get to enjoy everyone else's hell and we start seeing the lions pacing back and forth, and even though the odds of getting eaten are the same...low....we nevertheless don't get to enjoy the bliss that ignorance once allowed.
Is there hope in the ruins of suburban sprawl? Maybe:
Atlanta Community Offers Amenities of Earlier Age : NPR
This is the type of housing infrastructure worth investing in.
Wouldn't touch AZ unless your community has a long-term water conservation plan and is as sustainable as possible. I regret to say I see some very interesting times ahead for these families, when water starts drying up and gas prices make the shipped-in goods they depend on prohibitively expensive.
Boomburgs are inhabited by sheeple and spamalopes thus explaining much of their predisposition towards victimhood.
re childhood changes
When I was a kid (60's) my mother was one of the few that worked in the neighborhood. All the fathers worked. I went home after school (to an unlocked house, I believe) but it was understood that I could call on Mrs D one house down, and Mrs H, two houses up, in an emergency. I think the only time I ever did was when there was an enormous bug in the living room, and Mr H came to my rescue. I got teased about that a lot.
I wasn't responsible for my four years younger sister until I was 12: she stayed with Mrs. H after school. My main form of entertainment those days was reading, so my parents no doubt figured I wouldn't get into too much trouble.
It was a different world. Many neighborhoods now seem to have no adults around during the working day.
Maricopa seems to be the home of people who are unable to manage relationships. There is nothing more pathetic than a divorced Dad in his 40's buying a stucco palace he can't afford to impress his teens. No material compensate a kid for his self centered parents getting a divorce!
George C | Homepage | 04.06.08 - 8:31 am | #
George, as a Divorced Dad, all I can say is: GO FUCK YOURSELF.
The Phoenix area gets most of its water from the Salt River.... many of the small towns (Scottsdale, Guadalupe, etc.) were actually started as 'water user's villages.. housing for farm help.
Groundwater withdrawal is a fairly common supplement or sole source for towns outside the Salt River Project service area. On the edges of the cities, groundwater withdrawal has caused subsidence.. sinking.
Bringing water from the Colorado to the Phoenix area requires huge amounts of electricity for pumping water uphill out of the Colorado, and I think two other uphill runs before Phoenix.
Whenever water conservation measures have been brought up for local votes, they have been rather soundly defeated. This causes long time native s like my mother to say, "What are those people thinking?"
Water flows uphill, toward money and power.
Alo,
An old internet aquaintance Larry Felton Johnson has a far more realistic photo album of Glenwood Park: Glenwood Park 03/11/2008
Enjoy.
"fondue-fork wielding crowd"
This is an AWESOME metaphor!!!
Dawgs have territories to defend, and the pinnacle of human achievement that is exurbia is one of them.
Even when an exurban community is described in hellish terms (facts apparently not really in dispute), a dawg finds something to wag - an unincorporated region was subjected to heavy handed 'urban planning,' thus spoiling everything that is good and pure about exurbia. Except the 45 minute drive - at least they managed to keep that delightful facet of exurbia intact.
Because, truly, only human imperfections can mar the utopia that is exurbia. In the one true and real exurban nation, everything is as perfect as the mind can make it - where all that works is due to a lack of planning, and whatever doesn't work is directly traceable to the evil that is urban planning.
And some people wonder why those living in California have such a hard time with reality. Must be because of all that urban planning getting into the water supply, or something.
But I can hardly wait for more explanation of how a dawg can say that such a fittingly described example of exurbia constructed over the last several decades is not a perfect example of exurbia, but something entirely different.
Maybe if Maricopa would just start building nuclear reactors instead of schools, they could all drive electric cars, because no one ever wants to live in walking distance of anything, anyways.
And I wonder - would a dawg let a child actually get on a subway, alone, to get somewhere in a city, especially because the FBI has certified how dangerous all those urban spaces are? I mean, the child might start getting all sorts of crazy ideas, like how the subway is a fine way to get around one of the world's greatest cities, or even that maybe, the city isn't any more dangerous for children today than it was in the lives of children over many decades (except for the cars, but hey - if there wasn't any planning, even cars wouldn't be a problem). Those who would really want to live there must be deluded, simply neglecting the beckoning charms of the exurban nation that is Maricopa - which could only be improved at this point by getting rid of any urban planning regulations currently on its books.
Some people think a dawg's life is miserable - not me. I think it must be full of things that most of the rest us cannot recognize in our daily lives, being blinded by reality as we are.
Like those homesick kids, who obviously don't know that where they lived before does not meet a dawg's exacting standards of a suitable place to grow up in. Because kids are much easier to ignore than a mature, responsible, respectable, and infallible dawg.
I tend to think that those who have fond memories of a carefree, worryfree childhood
Speaking only for myself, I don't recall childhood being either carefree or worry-free.
Of course we knew there were threats. We were, um, out there in the world to see them. I don't remember mountain lions--wrong part of the country--but we had coyotes, skunks, and the odd feral cat. Plus, of course, there were no leash laws in those days. You saw kids out on bikes get hit by cars. There was the "dirty old man" down the next block you were warned to stay away from.
I hardly think it was all romantic playtime without a care in the world. I worry about parents who want their kids to grow up "carefree" and "worry free," because the world isn't that kind of a place, and also because that's just ignoring the different anxieties inculcated in the current generation, who now have "leaving the yard" as a terror instead of "getting run over by a car," which they can undoubtedly not imagine, having never been out on a bike.
Nor am I foolish enough to think that letting one's kids run wild is particularly wise. I have no idea why these things always come down to apparently binary, black and white choices. That I blame on teevee.
The very reason I started with the observation that I hate to be nostalgic is, precisely, this. One cannot evoke anything one did happen to like about one's childhood without, it seems, falling into or being pushed into the rhetorical trap of "those happy golden years." Bleh.
Yossarian - Marcus Aurelius probably knows all about building gravity fed aqueducts and they last a long time too.
Rob, you are a libertarian fool (as if there were any other kind of libertarian) if you think "overheavy planning" and "no high school" are somehow compatible concepts.
The definition of a "nice house" has certainly changed over the years! Our house was clean and "nice" by 1950s-1960s standards, but today? Still nice, but probably not desired by today's parents. The bathroom was smaller than today's closets and the "media room" was a small black-and-white TV in the corner of the living room. When transistor radios appeared, teenagers thought they had died and gone to heaven. Top 40 all day, every day!
Well, what can I say? I happen to love these nostalgic observations (perhaps not a steady diet of them, however). So much happier than thinking about the coming meltdown and end-of-empire era, which I do think is long overdue. I'll think about that tomorrow, unless we're all gone with the wind by then.
I hope some of our stories will linger in the historical memory, along with the torture and war and criminal behavior. But, I wonder.
George Soros is on bloomberg @ 9:30 (west coast)
I think parents are putting children and teens too much in the mindset that "someone should provide you with something to do." Important life lesson: there are always plenty of fun things to do. Think 'em up.
Those teens who don't learn this lesson end up ferrying their own children back and forth to lessons and athletic practices the rest of their lives. Rather them than me!
dryfly,
Perhaps a more appropriate rock blogging video:
< a href="http://www.truveo.com/The-Who-Baba-ORiley/id/3928130879">Teenage Wasteland
Oops--just follow the link:
The Who Baba ORiley Videos - Truveo Video Search
Darren,
"Libertarian fool" is redundant, since by definition, a Libertarian is someone who believes in personal responsability, and we all know what a foolish idea that is.
Uh, nanny "state"
I'm a pretty conservative guy, which is why I moved back to Tx, although I have been working in a housing job with high federal and state subsidies.
Our government is, surprise to y'all here, dysfunctional in thought and action, so must those of us who vote be also because we keep returning the same folks over and over again.
Government has a heavy hand and by virtue of the approx 30% of economic activity which it wields, has entered the tent. Who among us here spend a significant amount of their time dealing with regulations? Who actually read these CFR and agency regualtions to see how pervasive the bureaucrats have become in how we live. Look at the idiots in CA wanting to ban smoking inside your apartment or all the other idiotic things going on while the deficit is approx $14B.
Pls don't get me wrong, the markets need regulation. Government has a role but it is fast moving from a benevolent force to a malignant dictator of social and economic mores. In CA, the lawyers go aroung finding places without correct signage and suing with the idea they can settle because the cost of defending yourself is so high as to be injustice.
Before I leave you each to your own experience so we can move on, it is taking a thought and moving to action against those powers that steal our personal freedoms every single day that will make the difference. BTW, I do not smoke but I will not be silent when others come for those that do.
I think a remember reading a post that suggests that this housing problem is impeding (physical) mobility in the US. Although this might make for a less efficient economy, I'm sure that many kids won't complain, and they'll be able to build relationships with their peers that are just a bit stronger than the ones that X-ers were able to build and that Boomers might have taken for granted.
Tanta,
When I was young we used to play kickball in the street. We'd have car spotters and we learned to dodge the odd speeder who came of a sidestreet.
I wouldn't recommend the same for kids whose house opens up to a freeway.
Sometimes the environment changes so, that the threat overcomes their ability to avoid it.
My experience is that teenagers will be bored and will complain about where they live, no matter what or where.
luvin_grits writes: "...markets need regulation
Markets need rules, rules that are consistently followed and consistently enforced, not regulations which subject to the whims of politcal policy.
They built sidewalks on only one side of the street to save money.
the beauty of the free market.
Agreed, Baron... that regulation and enforcement is usually supplied by a government.
By the way.. about the water supply in Arizona? Like I said earlier in the thread... most water comes from the Salt River system... the most expensive water comes from the Colorado River... that's because it required billions of dollars to build and run the canals and pumping plants (I counted 15 plants on the CAP map). Since this was mostly federal dollars, we've all had a share of paying for the suburban mess in Arizona.
401 Authorization Required
Of course, the Colorado is not running like it used to, and every kind of energy is getting more and more expensive...
Again, Jim Kunstler is a bit nuts... but it's difficult to exaggerate the problems Arizona has created for itself.
I live in a subdivision built in 1960. There are NO sidewalks. It also happens to be in the best school district in the state, although our neighborhood is modest. Kids still play ball in the street, with spotters, although the neighborhood "leaders" tried to set up a homeowner's association last year which would have made this forbidden. Luckily they failed. I let my kids go out, but with some caveats - don't bike on the bike path (too isolated) - go on the street, which sounds scarier, but isn't. Funny thing is, my younger daughter (13) won't go out - too scared. Of course, she's also afraid of thunderstorms. I think it's her.
dynamitejacket writes:
They built sidewalks on only one side of the street to save money.
I would suggest that any sidewalk was a waste of money and indicates poor tought processes on the part of the planners.
I can't imagine what these parents would think of Berlin - children as young as seven get on their bikes and ride to school alone.
Also reminds me of the case in NY where a Danish woman left her infant outside on the sidewalk for some fresh air in February while she sat 3 feet away in the window (child was all bundled up - and assuredly sleeping like a log based on my experience). She was arrested and had the child stripped away until the embassy intervened. NYers thought is was doubly criminal - it's cold and there are child snatchers out there! - Danes could not even comprehend the fuss. Very amusing case of cross-cultural confusion.
I believe that statistic imply that your child is safer with strangers than a trusted relative as far as abuse!
Children who grow up in secluded developments are lucky to escape the "The Lord of the Flies " syndrome.
Average Joe- in this case I think you're extrapolating too much from the extreme cases. The case of violent teenagers is happening anyway, even with our precautions. What is the danger on the other side? Mal-adapted socially inept kids?
BTW- I believe that's Fry's was founded in Texas and two brothers took the name in separate direction's (the stores have the same Logo face).
Average Joe said,
I don't hear people claiming that the buyers were criminals, only that they, like those that enroll in MLM schemes, were one part of a two part scheme to make money and essentially forgot what the purpose was of buying a house and living in a community.
This is a great thread actually. I think most are missing the point of what Tanta is saying. It is not about any individual's motives, it is about our culture. We need to examine our CULTURE!
Buying a house is what Americans are supposed to DO! We believe an education leads to more opportunity. We believe hard work eventually pays off. We BELIEVE, always and everytime, that property ownership is the smart thing to do to live a prosperous life.
No matter what! This is so integrated in our culture we don't really notice. The fish not noticing the water.
I have watched several smart professional friends, not greedy, impale themselves by buying even when they knew that they might have to move in a couple of years. When I gently probe, it is clear that that is just what you are supposed to do. It is ASSUMED to be the right decision! Their parents say so, our leaders say so ("ownership society"), their friends say so, their financial advisors say so! For the love of god, people are trying desperately and ignorantly to try and make it!
Our kids are inundated by sophisticated and intentionally designed advertising for bad food while simultaneously a culture of fear keeps them inside and we wonder why they are fat! Parents themselves are increasingly ignorant and confused about cooking and food. We have to have experts tell us how to eat. Listen to your grandmother!
We WORSHIP unquestioningly free market ideology and the flexibility of the work force and wonder why communities are not as cohesive! No @#$&, if we move every 5-7 years you break up community!
I am not arguing for or against any particular social/economic organization. I don't know what would work actually. But many of the standpoints here are argued from a fundamentalist standpoint.
What I know is that as I look over the American social and economic landscape, I don't like what I see.
George, as a Divorced Dad, all I can say is: GO FUCK YOURSELF.
I gotta second that. I'm a divorced dad raising his kids in a rented inner city apartment. Is that more or less pathetic than buying a stucco box in the boonies? Is there a pathos commission that can give me an official ruling on that?
It's amazing how every opportunity to talk about real issues devolves into tirades about People I Don't Have Sympathy For (or, for some, How the Government Ruins Everything) -- usually based on some imaginary backstory.
My own personal theory is that's all whistling past the graveyard. You read about people who've hit hard times and need to come up with some way to reassure yourself that: a. those people deserve whatever bad things happened to them, and b. you deserve whatever good things happened to you, so c. nothing bad can ever happen to you.
Our local paper's website has a comment section, and the comments for stories about the usual everyday tragedies are usually along the lines of "Darwin strikes again". After all, the commenters would never do something without thinking it all the way through, or be poor, or be in a bad neighborhood after dark, so they can rest assured they'll live forever.
The problem is that when a civilization provides an "educational" system that promotes consensus over independent, critical thought, the predictable result is a stupid, inert populace incapable of separating the wheat from the chaff. Of course these houses got sold - it only takes a knowledge of the current "memes" to create a pitch that works.
This society is run by computers that use statistical models to control the population and it's a real SOS recipe. Makes you look at a FICO score in a whole new way.
Stop looking for exotic motivational reasons. The consensual groupthink stupidity that comes from a bad education covers a lot of bases and you can bet most of the people in these exurbs have self-selected.
It's not a housing problem. It's us and I don't suppose we'll change for the better anytime soon.
I'm not picking on the kids here, by the way. Individually they're just victims as are most of us.
Knowing the truth hasn't set me free but at least I know I'm in prison. That's not a happy observation but it's a start, I suppose. You can't break out if you don't know you're in.
Well, if we are going to wax nostalgic on this thread, I grew up in a small town (pop 4,000) in northern Calif. Us kids could and did hop on our bikes and be out of sight from the house in two minutes. With the logging roads in the woods nearby, we were gone for hours. If something happened, our parents would have no idea where to start looking. Curiously, nothing bad happened. My mother's idea of a bad day was when it was raining so hard us kids had to stay inside.
Sidewalks are over-rated. Pedestrians in the street make good targets with points based on ability to dodge traffic and if you are the pedestrian/biker, you can hone your awareness and dodging skills. It's a win-win situation.
By the way what would prevent the school system from converting one of the elementary schools to a high school?
all the anti-subs writers live in cities. Pick the best cities and yhou will see you can not afford to live there! I have lived in twso of Am greatest cities but now, married, with kids, give me a decent school system every time. Fact: 50 of highschool kids in cities do not graduate!
Hey, I like fondue. You have a problem with melted cheese and bread?
The only problem I had with the woman sending her kid on the subway was that she only gave him a bunch of quarters for pay phones. There's not that many pay phones in the city, and they're pretty skeevy. Man, I remember when there was a big hubbub about kids having beepers in high school. Oy.
The aerial view of Maricopa made it painfully obvious where each of the developers had built their subdivisions. That place isn't a city, it's just a convenient intersection of two highways where multiple unrelated residential subdivisions were built.
Another problem is the size of the houses the 1.85 kids rattle around in. When the kids are in one wing and the parents in another, stupid things can happen. My old neighborhood, starter houses of the late 1950's, had 2,3,4 kids growing up in 1,000, 1,100 sq. ft. houses. These places were too small for us to get away with anything too stupid at home; the grownups would know. We had to look elsewhere for our stupids. Add the fact it was a working-class neighborhood; no adults going off on frequent weekend excursions leaving teens behind, no 'second home' for anyone I knew.
Now that I think about it, how did so many of us get so screwed up when there was so much oversight?
A bit OT, but I too loved the "fondue-fork wielding crowd" reference. Throw in some butane kitchen torches and we've got a Williams-Sonoma lynch mob. Being a transplant to the semi-urban world myself, I find I'm irritated by a certain superiority in that suburbanite handwringing about the city.
And yet, statistically, the kids are more at risk to dying from injuries in a latte-spill induced S-swerve in their parents' 45K top-heavy rollover-prone family-room-on-wheels.
In Tokyo, you see grade-schoolers on the subway with their [insert latest anime craze here] lunchpails. Granted, that is a far safer nation, but it just goes to show how different our relative perceptions of safety can be.
Like Tanta, I grew up in Smallville and biked everywhere, but unlike today's suburban sprawl, my community had been zoned at the turn of the century and was very bike-able. I shudder to think of kids trying to bike around some of the sidewalk-less 4-lane-highway-riddled suburbs of my city. Talk about unsafe!
"Now that I think about it, how did so many of us get so screwed up when there was so much oversight?" PA
Must have been the lead paint.
Baron
Who writes the rules, the hedgies? the 6% NRA rule of thumb? Caveat Emptor?
Just for semantic fun, the 1st search item from Google pn answers.com : "A rule or order prescribed for management or government; prescription; a regulating principle; a governing direction; precept; law; as, the regulations of a..."
It is all subject to the whims of money and power see Glass-Stegall Nice article at Demise of Glass-Stegall Alters Role of Banks, Brokers, Insurers - Memphis Business Journal:
The problem as I stated above is us. The money buys the access and us, read thoughts to action, were given the power in the D of I and the Constitution to vote. If we let the money tell us how to vote, guess who gets both the power and money.
"It's not what you know but who you know" How do you get to know a politician, check or money order?
A classic demarcation can be seen in the purported philosophy of the rich Republicans with their money voters and the loving Democrats with their downtrodden voters. But, how many poor members of Congress do you count?
Compare the median in their districts and states. Look at them from a demographic standard, age and sex etc.
My best friend told me years ago watch where the money goes. On one of the news shows this morning, uh, I channel surf and forget, McCain is possibly toast because he can't raise enough money?
Back to the kids, How 'bout that charitable contribution of your TIME?
How about that drumbeat of woe is me that brings mediocrity to our schools? Did ya know at about 30 years of teaching in CA, retired teachers get up to 95% of their last years of salary in retirement until they die? Did ya know you can retire from the state government and get contracted as a consultant and make scads more? Are you in such a group? Is it O.K. that our society can't keep kids in school even with all the money we throw at it and spend because the CA Teachers Assoc has a fabulous lobbying effort for their members but to fire a teacher, gad zooks, the horror?
Yea Hah, any one got a fix?
I would suggest that any sidewalk was a waste of money and indicates poor tought processes on the part of the planners.
baron samedi | 04.06.08 - 12:48 pm | #
If they had really been planning they would have put no sidewalks in - from the sales data looks like no ones gonna alive there anyway so who would be walking?
sdrenter writes:
George, as a Divorced Dad, all I can say is: GO FUCK YOURSELF.I gotta second that.
I triple that. I give honor and respect to any divorced parent who has to raise their kids. I am not divorced but I see too many who are and its darn hard for 2 parents to raise kids nowadays and work, pay the bills, spend time with the kids, do homework, etc. There is no time for the parent, being always on the run.
What concerns me is that there are damn too many divorces and families get hurt. my thoughts are with you and your family SDrenter.
Bob in MA
"I remember once when there was a random killer about, someone had been shotgunned in an alley a block up from ours."
Ahh, the old Mt. Pleasant/Adams Morgan random shotgun guy that the cops couldn't find - even though they had full description and the guy repeatedly struck in about a one mile radius. I lived there at the time. I think I would have made the kids play indoors or at least go on a playdate in Georgetown.
re: fish not noticing the water
I once lived in an old neighborhood in Fullerton, taking care of a deceased relatives home while the family decided what to do with it. the relative had lived there since the place was built- 1950's. Many of the original owners, or their kids, still lived there, and they all knew each others family histories; neighborhood sweethearts, war dead, births- real Mi Familia stories.
every front yard or over-the-fence conversation eventually turned to complaining about the new folks moving to the neighborhood: "investment homeowners" who didn't talk to anyone and who's kids you never saw outside. they were always saddened, usually saying something like: "the neighborhood is dying".
some neighborhoods, like all the Maricopas out there, start out dead.
More nostalgia:
By the way what would prevent the school system from converting one of the elementary schools to a high school?
In that ideal small town I referred to above, one year a kid did not want to go back to school at the end of summer so he burned the junior high to the ground (totally awesome fire!). The school district coped by sending the high school kids to school in the remaining building from 6AM to noon. The junior high went from noon to 6PM. Everybody involved hated that kid with a passion. ...on the other hand, the town got a new school out of the deal...
The older I get, the better it was.
By the way what would prevent the school system from converting one of the elementary schools to a high school?
As far as I can tell, the deal here is that elementary schools can be located in inhabited neighborhoods, but if it's a high school it has to be miles from everyone's backyards. So they couldn't turn the elementary schools into high schools, because the buildings were already in neighborhoods. It would be like turning the elementary school into a jail. Or something.
At least that's what seems to be the case. I feel like someone who is reading something in a foreign language she doesn't read often enough to be fully confident in.
I roamed around freely since I was 4 and I never got killed. Just gave me a sense of independence. In my opinion, parents are over-protective because they are more worried about what other parents will think of them versus their concern for their kids.
At least that's what seems to be the case. I feel like someone who is reading something in a foreign language she doesn't read often enough to be fully confident in.
Tanta | 04.06.08 - 1:12 pm | #
Besides the boys would all have to get on their knees to pee in the 'men's room'... not a pretty thought.
all the anti-subs writers live in cities. Pick the best cities and yhou will see you can not afford to live there! I have lived in twso of Am greatest cities but now, married, with kids, give me a decent school system every time. Fact: 50 of highschool kids in cities do not graduate!
I don't think that's entirely true. I grew up in an inner ring suburb largely laid out in the 20s. It had/has one of the best school districts in the state and was almost entirely walkable. (Of course, there was a story in the paper today that the school district invested in a CDO, sheesh).
I'm also curious what sort of city you would want to consider. I live in a smaller city now, which has some fine schools, and some which are not.
Namely: It is an unassailable truth of the universe that the best place to raise kids is in a "nice house."
I disagree with this too. Actually its the opposite. Smaller houses promote better and closer inter-family relations.
When I was growing up, some of the happiest, most likeable, well-adjusted kids we knew came from small houses, shared bedrooms, etc. Maybe the trend toward private bedrooms and large houses is part of the cause of the breakdown in the family.
As a single mom, I raised my two sons in Tucson during the 70's. From pre-school to the fifth grade. I had to work, so I found a job which would enable me to go to work early and come home when school was over. I left home at about 5:00AM and the kids were on their own to get up, get their breakfast, and walk to school. I would call them regularly from work. For play, they rode their bikes around the neighborhood and generally had "adventures" with other kids. I made the conscious choice that I was not going to raise them to be fearful, but to be adventurous. Such behavior (on my part) nowadays would have someone calling child protective services.
However, my youngest son eventually found himself rowing boats down the Colorado River and traveling the world for a short tv series; my oldest spent one summer living in the woods (near Flagstaff) and playing his viola on the street. Neither of them is fearful of life. (Which is not to say they haven't had some scary...for Mom...experiences.) Kudos to the Mom who sent her son off riding the subway.
My old neighborhood, starter houses of the late 1950's, had 2,3,4 kids growing up in 1,000, 1,100 sq. ft. houses.
You know, those houses are still there, and probably still have kids living in them. Not everyone lives the lifestyle we see on TV. Not everyone even wants to.
Hey rent_to_own
Lived in Germany years ago and remember watching the Polizie go thru the parking lot trying door handles, one opens!, they'd write a ticket, drop in on the seat, lock the door and move onto the next.
"I disagree with this too. Actually its the opposite. Smaller houses promote better and closer inter-family relations."
This is getting a little wierd now.
Actually the best place to raise a child is in a log cabin in the early 1800's where they can read by the fire and grow up to be president and free the slaves.
Perhaps Maricopa's next community will be log cabins with no electricity and outhouses....for the good of the children.
(Actually the best place to raise a child is in a family that loves them. Now can we get back to how these stupid $%##'s blew a housing bubble that is now crashing and every last one of us is secretly enjoying the show)
I disagree with this too.
Look, peeps. When I write something as sophomoric as "It is an unassailable truth of the universe," you can bet your last fondue fork that what is going on here is some variety of critique.
Did you all go to high school in Maricopa, or what?
Besides the boys would all have to get on their knees to pee in the 'men's room'... not a pretty thought.
I always trust you to zero in on the really important details that bring these nebulous social issues into stark clarity. You pisser.
Throw in some butane kitchen torches and we've got a Williams-Sonoma lynch mob.
Yes, but--HA!--the Stepford kids have taken over THE ONLY SUPERMARKET IN TOWN! You imagine these poor Williams-Sonoma mobsters, huddled in their perfect kitchens with their deadly equipment, having no fondue for supper tonight since they're afraid to walk into Fry's for cheese! Didja notice the interviewed kid noodling around with a hunk of cheese that was on its way back to the dairy case? Heh. Bet it was confiscated from one of the forking parents.
My old neighborhood, starter houses of the late 1950's, had 2,3,4 kids growing up in 1,000, 1,100 sq. ft. houses.
You know, those houses are still there, and probably still have kids living in them. Not everyone lives the lifestyle we see on TV. Not everyone even wants to.
sdrenter | 04.06.08 - 1:19 pm | #
We raised three kids in a house like that only older (circa 1915). We choose the location because it was walking distance to all the schools swimming pool (they were swimmers) and ice rinks (and played hockey)... worked pretty well until they built the new high school on the edge of town (about a miles away by crow and three miles by road - the youngest is in HS now and still walks home - straight line through orchards & woods & climbs up and over a 200-300 foot bluff).
There are still lotsa places like this - the world isn't all Maricopaed.
Have never seen them the police do that, but if a kid (or anyone, actually) gets in your car and causes damage or injury, you are at fault, because you did not prevent the other party from their actions.
I find the reasoning more than a bit strange, but then, it is another country.
Average Joe,
The problem with growing up in log cabins is they promote the wearing of funny, tall hats and the use of the word "score." Give me a yurt any day.
The problem with growing up in log cabins is they promote the wearing of funny, tall hats and the use of the word "score." Give me a yurt any day.
Elvis | 04.06.08 - 1:26 pm | #
Or a 'soddie'...
dryfly writes:
I would suggest that any sidewalk was a waste of money and indicates poor tought processes on the part of the planners.
baron samedi | 04.06.08 - 12:48 pm | #
If they had really been planning they would have put no sidewalks in - from the sales data looks like no ones gonna alive there anyway so who would be walking?
That too, but these are subdivisions planned around 2+ car homeowners, who don't walk when they can drive.
p.a.'s comment above about houses that have the parents in one wing and the kids in another also plays into this.
Subdivisions like these fill a sociological role, albeit a bad one. Until we can understand that role is, we will just keep coming up with bad ideas.
Yeah, rent_to_own
I think it's because they don't have enough lawyers. One would need lawyers to be able to blame the other guy's actions for the irresponsible actions of the owner.
Lots of lawyers here in the USA and plenty of case law and them pesky regulations to support them in assessing blame.
I want to disabuse the notion that excessive city planning is causing Maricopa's problems. The only planning was by developers. The original Maricopa that I saw 20 years ago still exists, the developers blew that off and started from scratch a mile or two before coming from Compton Terrace mkII.
The CAP has caused more problems than it solved(the destruction of Tucson's water infrastructure is a great place to start), but it should've made more sense to replace ag with something less water intensive: somehow they've even screwed this one up.
New developments on the west side have to obtain 100 year water rights, but that's a pinky in the dike.
But as long as SRP is my water provider I'm gonna let my mini orchard run wild.
What's more jail like: to live in a rural area with few amenities for the kids, or for parents to be afraid to let their kids actually do anything for fear of being accused of neglectful child abuse if their kids did something "un-safe"? It's a 2-way street of confinement.
luvin_grits writes:
Baron
Who writes the rules, the hedgies? the 6% NRA rule of thumb? Caveat Emptor?
If they published the rules before you signed the contract, then yes.
If the rules were created by the contract and there is a dispute, then there is already a system in place to resolve the dispute.
From what I have seen so far, most of the mess that we are in is not the result of the breach of governmental regulation, it's the result of people not following the rules of the contract.
A Rob Dawg / Othello mashup:
They planned not wisely but too well
baron samedi writes:
"...it's the result of people not following the rules of the contract."
(Someday I'll take time to learn the italicky stuff, maybe)
So Caveat Emptor wins.
So is Maricopa the site for the next "Last Picture Show" film, i.e., a slowly dying small town?
In addition, I know 2 people who own in Maricopa, one whom I told 2 years ago to sell at 10% off the comps and the other I told not to buy 2 years ago.
Neither listened, and the latter ate to relieve the stress which killed her income stream of intertube pRon.
The former now comps me drinks for investment advice.
luvin_grits,
We aren't talking about running down to the grocery store for a gallon of milk. Real Estate is is a complex transaction, crossing several professional fields that no layman can be reasonably expected to understand completely, and the financial markets doubly so.
If the buyers couldn't be bothered to protect themselves by having a specailst look at the investment, then yes, Caveat Emptor wins.
Besides the boys would all have to get on their knees to pee in the 'men's room'... not a pretty thought.
Why do you have to bring other peoples' shortcomings into this?
Gotta love this site, makes me go learn and sometimes, relearn stuff. That caveat guy has a reverse image, Caveat Venditor, "Let the seller beware."
See, the buyer is now walking because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, advisors in the real estate deal. Y'all know that old saying...Screw me once....
See, the buyer is now sitting out because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, ratings agencies in the securitization markets. Second verse, same as the first... Screw me once...
Everyone makes friends at this store, Howard explained. This is the hangout for Maricopa.
Cue the Cheers theme song. It songs like a lovely place. Their version of Cliff and Norm probably hangout in the liquor aisle. Hope they don't show up on the Tonight Show when Fry's finally closes, though.
I am somewhat forced to live in Phoenix, and what do I see?
Overweight kids and overweight people. Why? Because it's too fucking hot to walk or ride a bike if you're a kid. And the only free thing to do out of the heat is to hang out at the food zoo of the mall.
So culture here is Abercrombie and Fitch kids in their $1,000,000 homes with the maid and the nanny off the golf course, or overweight goths at one corner of the mall or anorexic emos at the other corner.
If I had to hang out at a mall when I was a kid, I would kill myself or do meth. Luckily, these kids have chosen to eat food and do meth.
A high percentage of these kids are going to end up on meth or speed. It's the Arizona way.
luvin_grits writes:
Gotta love this site, makes me go learn and sometimes, relearn stuff. That caveat guy has a reverse image, Caveat Venditor, "Let the seller beware."
See, the buyer is now walking because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, advisors in the real estate deal. Y'all know that old saying...Screw me once....
See, the buyer is now sitting out because the seller screwed him/her as did those trusted, but non-fiduciary, ratings agencies in the securitization markets. Second verse, same as the first... Screw me once...
May I suggest you take up bumper bowling as a hobby?
I'm still boggling that a community built for families in Arizona has golf courses but no pools. I suppose pools are worse than jails too.
"If I had to hang out at a mall when I was a kid, I would kill myself or do meth. Luckily, these kids have chosen to eat food and do meth."
What is wrong with a little fat and meth use between friends? It is better than singing karoke and text messaging all day.
- NY Times
casino's rev's down yoy
I just thought of something - anytime I've looked at houses ( 5 so far in my life ), a key metric was access to (good) schools, via catchment area( in a public school quota type system) or just because they were there ( or NOT) , local school quality etc - not because we have kids - we don't - but because that's a key input into property values ! Access to the YMCA, swimming pools, health centers, soccer fields, local good vets and as I got older, good medics were also important inputs into the value/price of a house.
Why weren't the people buying in Maricopa checking on the high school aspect and either discounting the price appropriately or just not moving there ? Yup, as I think more about this, once again I edge in the direction of "blame the victim" type of thing.
-K
: MEFO Bonds and the roots of The Fed:
An imaginary company
Mefo bills - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hjalmar Schacht formed the limited liability company Metallurgische Forschungsgesellschaft, m.b.H., or "MEFO" for short. The company's "mefo bills" served as bills of exchange, convertible into Reichsmark upon demand. MEFO had no actual existence or operations and was solely a balance sheet entity. The bills were mainly issued as payment to armaments manufacturers.
Mefo bills were issued to last for six months initially, but with the provision for indefinite three-month extensions. The total amount of mefo bills issued was kept secret.
Hjalmar Schacht - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Re: chacht negotiated several trade agreements with countries in South America, and South-East Europe, ensuring that Germany would continue to receive raw materials from those countries, but that they would be paid in Reichsmarks; thus ensuring that the deficit would not get any worse; whilst allowing the Nazis to deal with the gap which had already developed. Schacht also found an innovative solution to the problem of the government deficit by using mefo bills. He was appointed General Plenipotentiary for the War Economy in May 1934[6] and was awarded honorary membership of the Nazi Party and the Golden Swastika in January 1937.
Schacht had been president of the Reichsbank between 1923 and 1930, but had been dismissed. Now he would return in triumph. He felt vindicated. Within weeks, the ingenious solution to Germany's pressing financial woes would burst forth from his inventive brain.
"It was necessary," Schacht later explained, "to discover a method that would avoid inflating the investment holdings of the Reichsbank immoderately and consequently increasing the circulation of money excessively."
"Therefore," he went on, "I had to find some means of getting the sums that were lying idle in pockets and banks, without meaning for it to be long term and without having it undergo the risk of depreciation. That was the reasoning behind the Mefo bonds."
What were these "Mefo" bonds? Mefo was a contraction of the Metallurgische Forschungs-GmbH (Metallurgic Research Company). With a startup capitalization of one billion marks - which Hitler and Schacht arranged to be provided by the four giant firms of Krupp, Siemens, Deutsche Werke and Rheinmetall -- this company would eventually promote many billions of marks worth of investment.
Emma:
""I'm still boggling that a community built for families in Arizona has golf courses but no pools""
Well, it makes sense to me. A pool is used by children, most too 'poor' to afford their own home pool.
A golf course, well hey... even a developer and a state senator can use that.
So, The New York Times sends another pith-helmeted writer out into the heart of flyover country to investigate the culture and lifestyle of what they regard as primitive inhabitants. Of course, the reporter finds ennui here. It's boring compared to Manhattan.
I would hardly call Maricopa flyover country. To me it looks a lot a smaller version of San Jose on speed. And believe me you having grown up in San Jose I'm not being nice. The problem I have with places San Jose is that unlike flyover country and the dense neo-urban cities, there there is no real community. And people suffer greatly from the ill effects of social alienation and too much time spent in front of the idiot box. And thats not me being grumpy, most of the friends I grew up with felt the same way, and so too the younger people I've occasionally met from down there.
I believe that everything changed in the early seventies when we, as a society, decided we had to have two incomes in a family to live the good life. The kids did pay a price for that and continue to do so. No judgement here, just an observation.
Fry's Foods and Fry's Electronics are run by the same family. I recall chatting with John Fry just after the first Fry's Electronics opened in Sunnyvale in the 80's. This was right about when the commercial real-estate bust hit Silicon Valley, so doubtless he got his tilt-up space for a song.
John said that he'd been amazed at the haphazard way the electronics and computer stores marketed their stuff--and the size of the margins that were realized. He compared this to the supermarket mentality, where margins are razor-thin and volume is sky-high and stuff that doesn't sell doesn't get shelf space.
I recall the first store as being one of the few places that you could find Jolt cola--you'd see guys piloting hand trucks loaded with cases of it in the parking lot--there was also some really terrible sugar-free chocolate-flavored cola. But you could also buy a VME backplane or a big-screen TV there.
The shrewd thing was that he located the store in the middle of an industrial park and accepted corporate POs. So engineers looking for a certain part would just as soon visit Fry's on their lunch hour as place an order with Arrow or Hamilton-Avnet. It was also the place to browse looking at new technology--I remember buying my first box of Fuji 3.5" high-density floppies at Fry's; at $44, they had the best price in town.
Ah well, those were the days...
Great post, Tanta -- there are so many worthy topics here, it's hard to know where to begin.
I lived in Tucson in the early 70's -- attended Pima Community College, lived in fixer uppers, in a tent in the desert, out of the back of my pickup truck in the desert, lived with friends, hitchhiked around the country, and generally had the best adventures of my youth.
It was apparent then that the white belt curmudgeon crowd was very influential in Arizona -- think of Goldwater Republicans, who want their private neighborhoods with free public golf courses and no kids and no schools and no taxes and free water from the CAP (paid for by the Feds) to fill their swimming pools -- in other words, your typical gimme-everything-I-want-so-I've-got-mine-and-screw-everyone-else Libertarian Republican.
In this case, the developers brought that attitude to Maricopa, and the commissioners didn't realize the problems that would follow.
On a related note, Green Valley Ranch in Denver is another nice-place-to-raise-your-kids subdivision -- but 20 years down the road, they have a 9 hole golf course but no High School. Which means the kids go to Montbello HS, which is located in the older (and more run down) suburb to the West. Both have been hard hit by the 80/20 ARM foreclosure crisis, but Montbello seems to be stabilizing a little; GVR is like our own little slice of the Inland Empire, right here in Colorado.
Ah, townhouse living in the inner suburbs. About 15 minutes ago there was a thumping noise on the wall behind the TV and then my son 7-yo disappeared only to return for his jacket. Now he is playing street tennis with the girl next door. In his church clothes.
It is nice to live in a neighborhood with some free-range kids. I thinks sometimes the parents don't let them out because there are no other kids out there--there's a certain feeling of safety with a small crowd of kids, you figure they're less likely to be snatched by a man in a car or something.
Wow Baron! My secret hobby exposed on a blog!!
If you read early, you'd know I work in housing. Part is site selection, part is asset mgmt and most is property management with the attendant regulatory reading. I read ALL the relevant stuff and don't rely on just one opinion or frankly, trust single sources, in my work or personal finances.
I won't inflate myself to the decision making process but I do present and taken the questions and thus have learned how a bad deal can take down a company ( or individual).
Personal responsibility, in a perfect world free of greedy immoral and unethical crooks and fraudsters and those that prey on others, must be the ideal. Absent that perfection, what is your suggestion? Seems to me the current system without effective controls and subsequent penalties for the "bad guys" is going to make the next several years a socialistic party by those aforementioned voters who will punish everyone for the sins of those few.
BTW, thanks for reprinting my entire post.
Kids riding the subway. I rode the New York City Subway starting at age 8. By age 9 I went all over the city by myself. That included the Statue of Liberty, Grand Central Station, Empire State Building everywhere. It was great. My daughter was not so lucky. We lived in Oakland CA. While our neighborhood was beautiful and fairly safe, she never had the experiences I did. It's mainly public transportation. For a thin dime (dates me), I could get on the subway and go anywhere, and I did.
I guess my one question in all this is...
Is there a statute of limitations on shit done as kids???
One fine summer day at the age of 15 or so I drug one of the rusted wrecks of a car out of the neighbors yard with our tractor. We lived at that time on 5 acres on a pretty steep hill. See where this is going? So we put our dirtbike helments on,strap in and off we go down the hill. Drag car to top and do it again and again.
Well this gets boring so we build a RAMP. A ramp to get the car to flip on two wheels and roll over. Heck this kept us and the neighbor kids occcupied for a good couple of weeks...
Should I mention the ramp off the roof to jump our bikes into the pool?
Setting 1/2 full spraycans on a flat buring stump with fireplace tongs?
Oh,be thankful the average homeowner doesn't have a oxy aceteylene
torch setup...
I'll stop now...
Chris
Artical published on website of John Burns Real Estate Consulting
The Poster Child for Housing Excess:
The City of Maricopa, AZ
Nothing exemplifies the boom and bust of this cycle like the City of Maricopa, Arizona. A distant Phoenix suburb, the city's growth has been phenomenal:
1,040 people in March 2000
4,998 people in March 2004
24,625 people in July 2006
33,000 today
The city incorporated in 2003 and subsequently issued 11,350 building permits from 2005 through 2007. I visited the city again last month and I must say it is meticulously planned with beautiful new homes, schools and parks.
However, growth comes with a price, and that price was best illustrated when I got out of my car and read the foreclosure posters on the doors.
The tremendous growth that fueled Maricopa was driven by crazy speculative investment activity, both by investors and those who moved their families into the city. Some new homes have been reduced in price by 50% and are still not selling, because auction and bank-owned signs are everywhere. Why buy a brand new home from a builder in a community that will probably not be finished, when you can buy one in a completed community for less than the construction cost? To complicate matters, most potential new residents do not have a down payment saved.
City officials in Maricopa and many other high-growth cities have their work cut out for them. Construction in many outlying areas has ground to a halt, which means city officials in many cities will need to focus on all of the problems that come along with halted growth: abandoned homes, empty lots with stubbed utilities, infrastructure bonds that go into default, and rising local unemployment. I wish them well.
s there a statute of limitations on shit done as kids???
Not if you told your wife who nows tells you mother.
Every once in a while, Mom tells me how glad she is we never got caught.
Ann Landers once wrote the root word of teenager comes from the Greek (Roman?, it was a long time ago) for trouble.
Further full disclosure: the ideal small town I referenced above also has pot farms out in the woods (state owned) that I explored. Nowadays, you don't roam those woods without running into armed pot farmers.
Just another boom/bust cycle in the Arid-zone. Only this time with extra added attractions - like heightened levels of divorce, speculation through creative financing/no equity/equity extraction schemes/scams, and larger delusions of grandeur than in the past.
I'm a total product of this type of mindset. I was transplanted to the Arid-zone at the ripe old age of 10 from MA in the late 60's. Back then "Take your sinus's to Arizona" in bold print on slick color brochures declared, photographs of smiling people in western wear on horseback with panoramic unspoiled desert vistas and spectacular multicolored sunsets in the backgrounds. Reality was (and still is), anything but.
Nothing has been learned over the course of 40 years, and numerous cycles. Communities still spread and rise off the desert floor with no regard for creating or enhancing infrastructure prior to the onslaught. Years of unending road construction, drainage projects, school projects built long after the fact, business attraction sought through perk/exception/non-taxation, wasting/consumption of natural resources and energy still endures.
I'm still here (off and on), having survived my juvenile induction, even profiting from it. Frankly, it's contributed to my overall success in life, rather than detracting from it. I learned through real life experience what not to buy into.
Garage evolution theory (bonus material) - back then new houses came with single or double carports. Slowly over the years they lost favor, giving way to 2 car garages. 3 car garages are the new and approved gold standard. There are even some 4 and 5 car options becoming more widely available, including extended length/height options for those monster SUV's and pickup trucks. A few areas are sporting super duper size detached RV garages (some of which are so tall and outsized, they dwarf the McMansions they sit beside). Most of these garages are increasingly employed to store stuff, not just vehicles anymore.
I'll stop now...
Then of course there were the guns...
I remember telling my suburban friends that as kids we used to take guns to school - bring them right in and put them in our lockers. Pump shot guns, semi-auto 22s etc. We did that because the wrecks we drove didn't lock real well and you didn't want to leave the guns in them unattended... you know some 'irresponsible' person might get a hold of them as opposed to us 'responsible' sixteen year olds.
My friends ask... did the teachers know, what did they say? I tell them heck ya they knew... they would say..."Nice shot gun, how much did it cost? Did you stop at Goose Lake this morning on the way in? Get any?"
That world is as long gone as Abe Lincoln's candle light 'schoolin'. Now you'd probably do time in federal prison for bringing a shot gun to school even if it stayed locked in the trunk of your car.
And 'yes' the guys did hunt in the morning. I rarely did because I was an athlete & trained mornings. Many of my friends did stop & hunt ducks on their way in - unlike weekends there were no adults to compete with for the best spots.
This is a great thread actually. I think most are missing the point of what Tanta is saying. It is not about any individual's motives, it is about our culture. We need to examine our CULTURE!
Americans have a problem with this. I learned this two decades ago in the honors section of Sociology 1001. The professor walked in the first day and said:
"For the purposes of this class, I want you to assume that individuals don't make decisions. Everything is determined by group interactions. Now, you know that that isn't true, and I know that that isn't true, but it's how I want you to think for the purposes of this class."
There were two or three of these students, who were all pretty bright, that simply couldn't do this. When we were discussing divorce rates, and how they had climbed over the years, these folks couldn't move past the idea that there were just more individuals deciding to get divorces. It was very odd to watch.
luvin_grits,
I, too, work in the industry, as a land title underwriter, and also do not rely on any one source, since my company will be held accountable if there is problem with a transaction (deep pockets theory and all). And I to have learned that a bad decision can cause a company to go under (as I sit with my fingers crossed, waiting for the economy to take out several of the less reputable and fly by night companies in my market).
Having been subpoenaed by the FBI, the local LEA and private parties, I can assure you that there are systems in place to deal with both criminal fraud and breach of contract. And they are effective- several people are now in jail for fraud and a number of companies have shut down as a result of having been in bed with the bad guys.
As far as there being a Democrat in the White House this next time around, it became a fore gone conclusion when the economy went tango uniform and no one in DC seemed to notice.
And as far as the bumper bowling comment, youre a Texan son, so suck it up.
Further full disclosure: the ideal small town I referenced above also has pot farms out in the woods (state owned) that I explored. Nowadays, you don't roam those woods without running into armed pot farmers.
other jim | 04.06.08 - 3:01 pm | #
They did then too - have since the 40s in a lot of rural America where migrants went. Mexican migrants were growing pot allover the high plains as long as anyone can remember.
The key was most of the growers then KNEW you weren't after their pot - rather you were after deer, rabbits, etc. They wouldn't mess with you because it would bring the heat down on them BIG TIME...
It was an understood truce - you don't touch their crop, don't turn them in - they leave you alone. Besides in much of rural America - you KNEW the grower or his family... why would you mess with his 'shit'? Who did you like/trust better? Them or the feds/state?
The meth heads are a totally different matter - chemical induced paranoia is beyond any sort of reason or 'loyalty'. Fortunately most of the speed cookers did it in an abandoned farm house - you wouldn't run into them hunting.
Prof Elizabeth Warren in her video posted last night points out that builders don't build starter homes anymore. In the '70s middle class couples had to built up considerable equity in the two houses they traded up before buying a 3000 sq. ft. house. Homeowners described in this article, in effect, bought a house the size of the third home purchased by a family in the 70's without the equity cushion. Forced to bet "double or nothing", they are experiencing the predictable result.
I realize that this thread has spiraled off onto other topics, but I figured I would contribute my experience. I had the fortune/misfortune to spend a bit of time in Maricopa, doing some work at one the the "low-profile" car testing sites nearby. Maricopa was 3/4 of the way from Phoenix to where we were going (middle of nowhere), but much of that drive was through empty desert. When we passed through Maricopa, all of us in the car had the same thought.... Who in their right mind would build a town here? If you want to build a community that has to commute to Phoenix, why not choose the first piece of empty desest closest to Phoenix? The auto testing facilities and the Indian casino (and the Fry's) certainly don't support enough jobs to sustain the rate of building they were doing. Then, assuming you had a good reason for building in the middle of the empty desert, why would you cram the houses so close together you could reach out the kitchen window and touch your neighbors house? These were cookie cutter houses banged out at the maximum possible speed. I would hate to see what is behind the walls. We would see the roofers moving from house to house every day we drove through. Plus, as the icing on the cake, it was just around the corner from the biggest cow feed-lot I have ever seen. Depending on your proximity and the prevailing weather patterns, the place smelled like a cow's butt, to put it mildly.
Also, I will second what Mykingdomforanos said. The Fry's in Maricopa, was definitely a grocery store. It was probably the largest grocery store I have ever been in, and was certainly the pinnacle of civilization there.
It is sad to see what has happened, but I can't say it was completely unexpected. That place felt like bizarro world from day 1.
Dryfly, you are an exceptional storyteller. I hope you consider writing someday in your spare time. An updated Little House on the Prairie.
"For the purposes of this class, I want you to assume that individuals don't make decisions. Everything is determined by group interactions. Now, you know that that isn't true, and I know that that isn't true, but it's how I want you to think for the purposes of this class."
In a sense though, it is true. As an individual, I make decisions all the time but I am influenced to one degree or another by others, near and far.
Going back to that nostalgic ideal small town I first grew up in, we left when my parents decided us kids "needed" better schools as teenagers because that is what various people and society told them. So Dad took a transfer to SoCal (Riverside) and this poor country boy was shellshocked.
I could ride my bike for miles in any direction (well only two to the east) and still be in town. Had to ride my bike on the street because there was some stupid rule about riding on sidewalks.
I do wonder why in this age of Google, telephones and subscriptions to local papers, why people would move to an empty town without checking first to see if it is suitable for their family. I always thought the rule was, rent for a year before you buy when you move to a new town, so you are not stuck if you don't like the area.
I grew up in Colorado and moved to Tucson when I turned 21 -- one of the striking differences was the attitude towards water.
In Arizona, water comes out of the tap or a well and there's an unlimited supply; back then, something like 90% of the developed water was used by agriculture, for cotton and other crops.
Colorado has some of the best water laws in the country -- development began in the 1800's, with a first in time, first in line doctrine of prior appropriation. Beyond that, the state Constitution says that water priority is Municipal, Commercial, then Agricultural -- which led to the Irrigation Ditch Rights condemnation lawsuits back in the 1970's. Since they were going to lose anyway, the farmers accepted a 110% replacement trade with the City of Thornton -- 110% recycled water for the 100% fresh water they gave up.
The majority of water in Colorado is still used for agriculture, but that is changing; Aurora has appropriated most of the state's share of the Arkansas River, which has meant the end of flood irrigation in Rocky Ford. The farmers have adapted, using drip irrigation -- they still grow the best melons in the world. (Rocky Ford Melons: hot days + cool nights = high sugar content. California Melons = orange colored cardboard.)
Last year, the state shut down hundreds of irrigation wells on farms in the Platte Valley. Some of these wells dated back to the 1940's, but it was determined that they were depleting the aquifer -- and since they were junior rights, no more water. It sucked for the farmers, but it was good conservation practice.
On the positive side in Arizona, Tucson is using their CAP water to recharge the aquifer.
Kids on the subway: I used to ride buses and BART (the Bay Area's subway) across the bay from Oakland to San Francisco every day starting at age 10. I would go all over the place on my own, and never had a problem. From time to time, a crazy/weird person might try to talk to me, but I knew not to engage. And I was in the middle of the city, surrounded by other adults, perfectly safe. Never had a problem. This was in the late 70s-80s. I would love for my kids to have the same independence.
OT - But figured Tanta would get a hoot out of this..
Study: Men's brains link sex and money - Men shown erotic images more likely to make larger financial gambles
CNN.com - Page not found
Dryfly, you are an exceptional storyteller. I hope you consider writing someday in your spare time. An updated Little House on the Prairie.
Outsider | 04.06.08 - 3:30 pm | #
Thanks for the compliment. I've thought about it but don't think I have the gift - but I was there where a lot of the rubber hit the road for sure. I was in rural schools in the mid-south during forced integration (literally months after MLK was shot)... then moved up into the rural midwest as the early 70s 'liberation' ran into good ol'boy.
I was a watcher and a wanderer and saw a lot of stuff happen. I made friends on all sides of the story. I am still trying to make sense out of it all. Probably never will completely.
As I recall dryfly, you live a little north of where Mark Twain grew up on the Mississippi. Nice to see that the old storyteller-as-an-observer-of-life tradition hasn't died out up here.
Times never change, just the names, but people today are far less educared and far fatter, in general:
Hazlitt's "On Southey's Letter to William Smith" is to be found in Political Essays (1819). Letters to William Smith, Esq. M.P. from Robert Southey, Esq. which appeared on May 4, May 11th and May 18th of 1817.
"A Letter to William Smith" 1
Letter of May 5th:
From William Hazlitt's Political Essays, "On Southey's Letter to William Smith."
...he, the writer of the Inscription on Old Sarum, describes "a Reformer is no better than a housebreaker; he, the writer of the Inscription at Chepstow Castle, calls all those who do not bow their necks to the doctrine of Divine Right, Rebels and Regicides: he, the author of Wat Tyler, calls those persons who think taxes, wars, the wanton waste of the resources of the country, and the unfeeling profligacy of the rich, likely to aggravate and rouse to madness the intolerable sufferings of the poor, "flagitious incendiaries, panders to insurrection, murder, and treason, and the worst of scoundrels";
...e professes to be a convert, and by consigning over to a "vigour beyond the law" all those who expose his unprincipled, pragmatical tergiversations, or would maintain the system itself, without maintaining those corruptions and abuses, which were all that Mr Southey at one time saw to hold up to exercration in the English Constitution, and are all that he now sees to admire and revere in it. This is as natural in a Renegado, as it would be unaccountable in any one else.
This thread brings back memories of a book I was assigned as a college freshman: "Growing Up Absurd" by Paul Goodman (1960).
"The book puts forward the idea that western society is a paradise of consumerism, a 'confused, seduced, spoiled mass society' staggering from one problem to the next.
Oh, and Dryfly, since I've seen you comment on this often recently, here's an article that my fiancee` sent me on the current farm land price bubble.
For U.S. farmland, signs of a property bubble?
| Reuters
"HICAGO (Reuters) - Investors who have never sat behind the wheel of a tractor are helping drive the price of U.S. farmland to record levels, attracted by its assumed safety following the meltdown in mortgage-related securities and excited by the potential of plant-based biofuels.
But is agricultural land really a good long-term investment? Or could the rush into rural real estate be just another Wall Street craze -- one that ends like the Internet and housing manias that preceded it?
An analysis of rents -- a key measure of U.S. cropland values -- suggests the returns investors can expect from farmland are not only substantially below those available in the stock market but in a long-term decline to boot.
That disconnect -- between fast-rising farmland prices on the one hand and fast-falling returns from farmland rents on the other -- has some growers and government officials worried a bubble may be forming, one similar to the one that took hold 30 years ago and left rural America reeling once it popped.
Iowa Bank Superintendent Thomas Gronstal is among those concerned. "Current agricultural conditions," Gronstal told lawmakers in U.S. Senate testimony on March 4, "are reminiscent of conditions experienced in the 1970s, which led to the economic and financial collapse of the 1980s."
Gronstal said soaring crop prices made "the agricultural sector look strong." But he warned that retreats in those prices could have an immediate and devastating effect on land values.
"If there has been too much leveraged or loaned against the inflated value of farmland, the bubble will burst and we will once again experience an economic crisis similar to that of the 1980s," Gronstal said.
..."
"It is nice to live in a neighborhood with some free-range kids. I thinks sometimes the parents don't let them out because there are no other kids out there--there's a certain feeling of safety with a small crowd of kids, you figure they're less likely to be snatched by a man in a car or something."
That's the key to many of these misty-eyed stories about the good old days: a lot of other kids around, and some adults that everybody knew and could go to.
Though the best years of my childhood were spent in a neighborhood that would be kryptonite by today's standards.
Tales from the Coast: The Railroad Not Taken
I too, was sometimes gone on my bike from morning till nite and this wasn't a small town, this was Baltimore. I was warned never to take candy from strangers, and not to chase my ball into the street, we'll get you a new ball if it gets squashed. I walked home from school from 1st or 2nd grade. We locked our doors. There was a pool 5 blocks away to walk to in the summer.
EVERYBODY was treated this way. If we didn't bike, we walked & explored.
Had adventures. Our kids, now 38 and 27 were pretty much treated the same way. They are both independent and working and successful.
They walked or were bused to school.
I can't understand what's going to happen to the over protected kids of today.
I don't know of any kids who were hurt, except a couple who where abused right at home by funny uncles or 2nd husbands. There was one kid who was weird, but he got hurt blowing his face up with a chemistry set right at home.
This is utterly hilarious to see folks misunderstand the drive till you qualify crowd.
As for Pinal County, the home of cotton farmers and good old boys, the last real estate bust established that whomever "Git 'er done." was the winner in development.
As for pounding out the houses, the houses actually use less water than the foolish alfalfa and cotton flood irrigated fields they filled.
The late 90s settlement of water rights meant that a lot of the water that had been cheap was going to the tribes, and that the developers would pay big money for those water rights remaining to stick their subdivisions wherever the sups would approve maximum concentration. The subdivisions were being planted ahead of a sea change in the water rights, with a sustainable change in water rights made last year when Pinal County became an AMA, with recharge requirements (See the DWR rulemaking for more). Essentially you could no longer use the old cotton irrigation wells and draw down the local aquifer without putting water back in- gee can you say much higher costs?
Who, in their right mind, would donate the land, as the school district was asking, in the midst of their subdivision? In this case, the developers were pushing things in 640 acre blocks were correct. The real reason that the high school was not being built quickly enough is the school district (which has always existed in the greater area), had a high school in Casa Grande that they didn't want falling enrollment to endanger. Local politics explains almost all the bad economic development.
ADOT is responsible for the lackadasical construction of roads, but hey, we are ten years behind the development in Phoenix, so what else is new?
In other words, this was leapfrog style development Arizona style, with a concomitant collapse as easy money has left. Gee, is this 2008 or 1988?
Same old story, and same old results.
Someday this war's gonna end...
HICAGO (Reuters) - Investors who have never sat behind the wheel of a tractor are helping drive the price of U.S. farmland to record levels, attracted by its assumed safety following the meltdown in mortgage-related securities and excited by the potential of plant-based biofuels.
But is agricultural land really a good long-term investment? Or could the rush into rural real estate be just another Wall Street craze -- one that ends like the Internet and housing manias that preceded it?
If you assume that the markets are rational you basically have to conclude that investors figured out just in the past few months that people in India and China actually eat.
Just like people got religion one strange day in August 2007 (coincidentally when the Fed cut rates at the discount window) and figured out, for the first time in history, that people in India and China use oil.
My Dad moved our family out of Manhattan but we kept the same dentist in midtown. I used to love riding the train alone to his office (8 or 9 years old). I guess the ride home would have been cool too if he hadn't been such a freaking sadistic psychopath. Novocaine was for crybabies, as well as water cooled drills. Oh, the smell of it, yeah he was full blooded German too, that helped.
A bit late, I saw this via Atrios, but whatever. 'tis important I think:)
Identity Production in a Networked Culture:Why Youth Heart Myspace frankly is a must read work in this subject.
"s have increasingly less access to public space. Classic 1950s hang out locations like the roller rink and burger joint are disappearing while malls and 7/11s are banning teens unaccompanied by parents. Hanging out around the neighborhood or in the woods has been deemed unsafe for fear of predators, drug dealers and abductors. Teens who go home after school while their parents are still working are expected to stay home and teens are mostly allowed to only gather at friends' homes when their parents are present.
Additionally, structured activities in controlled spaces are on the rise. After school activities, sports, and jobs are typical across all socio-economic classes and many teens are in controlled spaces from dawn till dusk. They are running ragged without any time to simply chill amongst friends. "
This has actually been going on for a long time. The whole suburban thing is probably another symptom, and not a cause. If we were concerned with providing teens with appropriate public space, it would exist in these communities as well, although it certainly can not help, as fishing for property value DOES change how we act towards youth. (Keeping them unseen basically)
As someone who advocates for this sort of thing, there's nothing in the post at all that I have any complaint with. It lays out the problems of the communities (and that the kids are dealing with it remarkably well). But I'll leave you with a thought.
The rise of the social internet has prevented probably a thousand Columbines.
Thanks Rob Dawg - they are trying to make it look like Brooklyn! Looks kinda undersold from the pics, but anyplace that helps its residents burn less gasoline and heating fuel is going to be a lot more sellable as time goes on.
Oh, and Dryfly, since I've seen you comment on this often recently, here's an article that my fiancee` sent me on the current farm land price bubble. - Andrew
If you assume that the markets are rational you basically have to conclude that investors figured out just in the past few months that people in India and China actually eat. -ac
Both statements are 'accurate' when balanced. There clearly is a growing need for Midwestern food production on the world stage. However the prices being paid for land today don't justify that demand.
There is clearly a bubble blowing in rural America.
However the prices being paid for land today don't justify that demand.
Sloppy - should read:
However the demand doesn't justify the prices paid for the land.
One of the managers I work with just told me recently that when he was around 5 or 6, he and a group of friends from the neighborhood far west side of Chicago) would get one of the older boys (meaning 10 or so) along with their allowances and take the Addison bus all the way across Chicago and go to Cubs games by themselves.
The story they told their moms was that "they were playing baseball."
I guess they could to it for around 4 dollars or so, bleacher ticket, soda and hot dog in the stands and then a side trip to the baseball card store and a ride back home.
His mother still doesn't know. This would have been early 70's.
Both statements are 'accurate' when balanced. There clearly is a growing need for Midwestern food production on the world stage. However the prices being paid for land today don't justify that demand.
Yeah, I think that's an important distinction that needs to be made -- arguing that there's a bubble is not the same thing as arguing that prices shouldn't be going up or that there isn't a legitimate expectation for demand to increase.
In fact I think the underlying legitimacy is key to dragging rational people into the fray to begin with.
To argue that there's a bubble (as I see it) is just to argue that the market is severely distorting reality to profit a handful of players at the expense of everybody else.
"Also reminds me of the case in NY where a Danish woman left her infant outside on the sidewalk for some fresh air in February"
That one I remember. Even after the local tabloids published photos of Danish babes lined up in strollers in Copenhagen outside restaurants, the mommy outrage never faltered...as in how could she imagine Manhattan was as safe as Copenhagen.
I think they left NYC after they finally regained custody of their child.
The city child-protection services moved with lightening speed on this one. Couldn't resist going after an educated white woman--that she was Scandinavian was just icing on the cake. Would be more impressed if they could identify the kids being beaten and starved in this city, but the tiny victims seem to be identified only after their demise.
There is clearly a bubble blowing in rural America.
dryfly | 04.06.08 - 4:46 pm | #
I just looked around in NW Ohio where I still have relatives who farm. There is not a single farm for sale right now. Everything has been bought up. My dad sold the last of his land at 3-3.1k per acre in 2001-2002. Prime Ohio ground. Like I mentioned similar plats have sold for 10k per acre recently...Yep,that whole triple in price in three years will hold up...
All I will say 'bout guns in school is my youngest brother still brought one to school as late as 1990...
Chris
Yep,that whole triple in price in three years will hold up...
Crap,make that six years...
Chris
Also, one notable aspect of bubbles seems to be that informing people that there's a bubble doesn't necessarily dissuade them from participating in it because people just change their attitude: "OK there's a bubble, but I can get out before it bursts." And even though most participants will be wrong about their ability to time the ending, many of them will get it right and profit handsomely. Lacking this information ahead of time it's hard to argue that participating in a bubble is necessarily irrational. That's part of the reason it's hard to get rid of them and half-measures have a history of not working very well.
Again, I have to wonder if Bernanke is starting to rethink some of his criticism of the BoJ for keeping rates too high for too long (or if maybe it was just lip service).
It seems to me that we now have both a recession and bubbles at the same time. Something that suggests, to my pessimistic person, that any light at the end of the tunnel may be that proverbial oncoming train.
Tanta,
"What exactly is the 'threat' these kids have been permanently grounded to protect them from? Me?
See this site of California sex offenders:
California Megan's Law - California Department of Justice - Office of the Attorney General
Go thru the first 3 pages and enter or select any Ca zipcode.
We have debated whether the apparent increase in number of sex offenders is due to our society's permissiveness or just better reporting. I would like to see a statistical study to determine which is true.
dryfly,
We recently talked about rebalancing. You might have come across this as well at Brad Setser's. I found it particularly interesting at a time of record price increases in AG commodities. Puts these counries into an extreme bind by not even be able to address the issues.
Does the US still have a strong dollar policy?
Yet, Saudi Arabia, the heavyweight of the nations, has long been reluctant to make such a move. When Kuwait moved the dinar to track a basket of currencies last May, the US was unimpressed and that was before the dollar started its rapid descent. Gulf government officials privately argue the US would view such a move now, when the global economy is already fragile, as equivalent to a declaration of economic war, which would have security consequences.
A central bank official (speaking on condition of anonymity) tells Bloomberg that US Embassy officials last week told central bank Governor Sultan Bin Nasser al-Suwaidi of their concern about reports that the sheikhdom may drop the peg against the USD. The official says that political leaders have stopped the bank from developing any plans to move toward another currency regime.
Someone up-post mentioned the rise of social (computer) networking, and that's what I've heard also - this generation is finding, making, and maintaining friends online. I see it in my daughter, glued to Facebook. She has about, oh, 90 friends plastered on her page. I say - Joe? Do you talk to Joe? No, she says, I don't talk to Joe, but he's a friend on my Facebook page. Every other teen in her group has the same phenomenon going on - contacting each other with "will you be my friend" Facebook entries to gather as many photos as possible, like it's some popularity contest. So these teens may be staying home more, but they may be interacting just the same. Weird social phenomenon. What's that gonna look like in the future?
RE - I think the US gov't is worried about $200/bbl oil... maybe? If they drop the peg & still owe a bunch in euros... and all they sell is oil... where does oil go? Up.
As long as the US imports as much oil as it does & runs huge deficits funded by others to support our consumption (private & public) then the dollar will get weaker and weaker.
There is no way around it - Setser was premature thinking the re-balance would happen a few years ago... that didn't make him wrong on the underlying forces... he just underestimated the resistance.
BTW, Maricopa has a local community, the Ex-urb types just don't belong.
Maricopa's longstanding "community" is as the crossroads of many sections of unincorporated county and reservation cropland. The latino farmworker and white hick types who already lived here 6 years ago when land was $3K/acre hang out at the local cafe/bar, or shooting tin cans, or riding dirt bikes, or working on their spreads.
I agree with you. I actually think that $200 oil is not beyond belief for several reasons.
However, I am worried that preventing these countries from depegging actually will likely backfire as I believe it increases the chance of extremely high oil prices by completely unhinging inflation expectations in countries that are already experiencing high inflation. Forcing them to import even more inflation can only make things worse.
This story in the Guardian is a perfect example of where we may head towards. I am very concerned.
We are steering towards a train wreck unless rebalancing continues gradually. With these developments, rebalancing will happen as a result of riots and I believe even China will be forced involuntarily into a sudden change of course at exactly the wrong time.
We are steering towards a train wreck unless rebalancing continues gradually. With these developments, rebalancing will happen as a result of riots and I believe even China will be forced involuntarily into a sudden change of course at exactly the wrong time.
RE | 04.06.08 - 5:57 pm | #
Agree. Here's another blog on the same subject - sort of - over at Angry Bear
(Comments)...
Its like they don't even think about our consumption vs production 'imbalance' as an issue... it must be a God given right or something. The only question is how to keep it going... a little longer please, pretty please.
baron s--you are an underwriter? For all you non title people underwriters at title companies are the kings and queens of the real estate title law world.
I started working for an underwriter at Chicago Title when I first started practicing law.
Lawyerliz drools with admiration.
Looking at a house just a couple of lots down from my own. Sold for $330,000 Jan 07. Sold for $199,000 Oct 07. REO being offered at $99,000. Think I'm going check this out. Probably needs at $25K but with decent financing and 20% down - could pay its way for about $600 monthly rental over 15 years. Backs up to a school.
How to deal with stated income loans,
The Market Ticker
I think Karl Denninger is losing it.
RE writes:
I agree with you. I actually think that $200 oil is not beyond belief for several reasons.
RE...
Just remember we went from 40.00 oil to 8-10 in a couple of years. There was no/very little exploration in the nineties. Heck,none of the west coast of Florida is even open for exploration. I mentioned a while back a friend in Texas has been trying to get a couple of wells drilled on his property. 18 month minimum wait for a rig. The equipment is old and worn out. The problem is to increase production the needed equipment has a lead time of years...
You do know about the Bekkah(sp) oil field in the US,right?
Chris
Suecris writes:
I think Karl Denninger is losing it.
Suecris | 04.06.08 - 6:20 pm | #
LOL. Its kinda fun to watch.
Dry,
If and when there is a rebalancing trade between the US and China, will the US be able to reopen the closed industrial plants?
From my numbers perspective, I can't see how a plant can open and tool up in the US these days. It seems to me that once they're gone, they don't come back in this environment. However, my friend's specialty chemical employer did reopen in the US last year.
As an aside, we really don't know what the tax situation will be in a few years either. It could be very tough for entreprenuers to justify the risk.
Thanks,
No, tell us about the oil field.
If the govmint gets more money from tax cheats they will merely waste it. The tax cheats probably don't have the money anymore, so let's put 'em in jail which costs, what 40 grand a year apiece.
Please.
Also on the kid topic:
I soaped shop windows on Halloween. I and my friends would go in any empty house and explore. We never damaged a thing. If we had gotten caught, we would have got yelled at, but that's all. I shudder to think. . .
My hub used nitrogen tri iodide to weld a street car to the tracks. He was at the end of the line at a metal turnaround, the driver would go get coffee before his return run, and the expression on his face when the car wouldn't move. . . priceless.
He would have got in trouble then had he got caught. Now, he'd probably do hard time. He also set the street on fire, etc, etc.
Getting caught doing something bad and severely punished is worse than not getting caught as a kid, I think.
His life would have been ruined. Instead he is multiply degreed and works for NASA.
We recently talked about rebalancing. You might have come across this as well at Brad Setser's. I found it particularly interesting at a time of record price increases in AG commodities. Puts these counries into an extreme bind by not even be able to address the issues.
I'm surprised these countries haven't started pushing back a little. It seems like we're transporting alot of our problems overseas and getting away with it.
If our interest rate policy is starting to cause civil unrest in oil producing countries you'd think at some point they'd get the idea of threatening oil cutbacks if we keep devaluing the dollar.
Maybe that's why Bush has been trying to play nice with Russia recently.
I think Karl Denninger is losing it.
I think it's an amusing idea, if I'm getting it right:
"OK, you say you make $150,000 a year on your loan application - time to start paying the taxes of somebody who makes $150,000 a year, not somebody who makes $25,000 a year."
If and when there is a rebalancing trade between the US and China, will the US be able to reopen the closed industrial plants?
From my numbers perspective, I can't see how a plant can open and tool up in the US these days.
Ya the old is toast - it will all be new stuff. The old plants aren't even suitable for outlet malls or 'Loft Fodder' for the most part.
Some can be reused, most can't.
But the plants aren't the real asset anyway - its the skills between the ears of the folks that ran those old plants that is the key. They are still valuable if we access them before they die... then they have to train the next generation freaking fast.
As for how will it happen? Combine 'bootstrapping' and 'guerrilla marketing' and that is how it can be done. With a weak dollar it might be the ONLY way we maintain consumption going forward.
There were a couple of really good books I read in the early nineties about this - how to do turnarounds on a shoe string. Have the books back on the shelf not far from my desk - might need them: "World Class Manufacturing" & "Industrial Marketer's Guide". Almost funny they are so dated... don't even mention the Chinese - the yellow peril then was all Japanese. But the strategy was rock solid then & still is: advocated 'bootstrapping' big time.
Nothing ever changes except 'the enemy'.
Then of course there were the guns...
My kind of place! All of us neighbor kids used to get together and shoot clay pigeons in the open section right across the street. Ahhhh, those were the days!
OK I live in Phoenix and let me tell you, that NYT article captured the downside of living in Maricopa PERFECTLY (though I had no idea they had no high school).
It's 20 minutes away from civilization - that is, the nearest place with ANYTHING - movie theaters, decent shopping, and so on. Unless you like horseback riding or ATV riding, there is NOTHING to do there... unless you like gambling, there's an Indian casino at the south end of the town. But, of course, kids can't go there. This development was just plopped down in the middle of nowhere. It's the most bizarre thing, you can clearly see the core of the old rural Maricopa 'downtown' and then it looks like these ugly crackerbox homes and strip malls were just grafted onto it.
But hey... the homes were affordable! At least, by 2005 standards.
Now there's an 11 YEAR supply of homes on the market in Maricopa, according to a local realtor. I don't want to think what that place will look like if the residents start jingle mailing, it could turn into a 21st century ghost town.
It's The Music Man all over again.
We bought just before the early 80s bust, and the subdivision wasn't finished for years.
We used to shoot model rockets over the empty lots.
My son loved to climb over the unused fill mountains, and there was empty land he called "the weeds" to explore. He is 27 now. When he got to be about 9 the subdivision filled up. No more rockets. But at least he had the experience.
I think the US gov't is worried about $200/bbl oil
Damn straight. The military is gung-ho on certifying all of their equipment on alternative fuels, plus actively developing new suppliers of same.
p.s.: Thank heaven TPTB have resisted calls to open up the SPR every time prices spike. The idiots suggesting we use it don't seem to understand what the "S" really means.
OT:
This is great stuff:
Charles August Lindbergh
Charles August Lindbergh - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Aldrich Plan is the Wall Street Plan. It means another panic, if necessary, to intimidate the people. Aldrich, paid by the government to represent the people, proposes a plan for the trusts instead." - The Aldrich Plan (History of central banking in the United States) was a forerunner to that which spawned the Federal Reserve.
"To cause high prices, all the Federal Reserve Board will do will be to lower the rediscount rate..., producing an expansion of credit and a rising stock market; then when ... business men are adjusted to these conditions, it can check ... prosperity in mid career by arbitrarily raising the rate of interest. It can cause the pendulum of a rising and falling market to swing gently back and forth by slight changes in the discount rate, or cause violent fluctuations by a greater rate variation and in either case it will possess inside information as to financial conditions and advance knowledge of the coming change, either up or down. This is the strangest, most dangerous advantage ever placed in the hands of a special privilege class by any Government that ever existed. The system is private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people's money. They know in advance when to create panics to their advantage, They also know when to stop panic. Inflation and deflation work equally well for them when they control finance."
"The financial system [...] has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board. That board administers the finance system by authority of [...] a purely profiteering group. The system is private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people's money."
The reason why "stated income" loans originated was because the lenders said it was "to streamline the process". Because some folks "didn't want to go thru the hassle of getting together all their paperwork". It was never meant (according to the lenders) to be what it became: An opportunity to lie about your income so you can qualify, LIAR LOANS!
Karl Denninger's idea is on to something. If you are stating INACCURATE income on the 1003 (mortgage application) you are either:
Either way, you are breaking the law. I say, Find them.
If you can't afford your home, then your lies are costing the taxpayers.
If you are paying your loan, but are reporting less than you actually make, then your lies are costing the rest of us to pay more in taxes.
Either way, find the liars! It's time to grow up. If you don't like obeying the laws, go move to another country.
FTR grew up in a mini-ranch development in Northern Colorado. 10 minutes to nearest store, 20 to nearest anything else, 30 minutes to school (but the bus took 60). No videogames or cable TV, either. Didn't stop us from having FUN as kids.
Since when was "things to do" determined by proximity to commercial enterprises?
"But is agricultural land really a good long-term investment?"
My Dad used to say that once in every generation farmers had a chance to make money. Right now ethanol is handing that chance to them in the upper Midwest.
My hub used nitrogen tri iodide to weld a street car to the tracks.
Lawyerliz, Nitrogen tri iodide is an unstable explosive. So unstable I never used it as a detonator. And I never heard of anyone using it for spot welding. Did it really work?
I agree with you. I actually think that $200 oil is not beyond belief for several reasons.
I'm starting to think it could go either way, basically that we're approaching some kind of tipping point.
The markets are getting so out of touch with reality -- stocks rising as earnings decline, commodities skyrocketing as economies slow -- that rational market participants have been penalized to the extent that they're approaching the point of complete loss of faith in the markets or maybe just personal bankruptcy.
Basically it becomes a case of extreme adverse selection which drives all the people out of the markets that makes markets stable and leaves only the madmen standing (again, this is all consistent with historical market debacles).
I think when it becomes apparent that the markets have completely decoupled from the economy and sane people feel that they no longer have any grasp on where the financial markets are heading, you set yourself up for a real panic (which we haven't had yet) -- at that point no sane person will willingly hold financial assests.
I think in our case that would likely manifest in a run on the dollar despite manifest deflationary pressures. So I wouldn't rule out a panic that sends oil to $200 while wages and house prices fall.
Perpetuating a policy of decoupling the financial system from the economy because recoupling is too painful I think is going to bring us to a breaking point where sensible participants will no longer have anything to do with the financial system at all for having seen it betray reason one too many times.
Implicitly I've always believed that there's been some salvation awaiting the dollar at the end of the day.
For the first time I'm genuinely starting to consider that's not going to be the case.
Chris,
I assume you refer to the Bakken formation?
Bakken Formation
Extraction costs could be very high in today's environment. It was estimtated in the $20 to $40 range in the 90s with much higher costs today.
As you mention, drilling equipment and day rates have gone through the roof in recent years. More production won't happen even where available unless prices at these levels can be maintained.
Karl Denninger's idea is on to something. If you are stating INACCURATE income on the 1003 (mortgage application) you are either:
Either way, you are breaking the law. I say, Find them.
If you can't afford your home, then your lies are costing the taxpayers.
No, no... we have to keep perpetuating the lies because nobody can handle the truth.
Can't you see the sense behind that?
I think in our case that would likely manifest in a run on the dollar despite manifest deflationary pressures. So I wouldn't rule out a panic that sends oil to $200 while wages and house prices fall.
We're already on that road!
As we've discussed previously, there's nothing that precludes domestic deflation coupled with a continued USD devaluation vs. foreign currencies.
Re: "Look, peeps"
Why do you group us this way, like children?
since when did this blog devolve into the anarchist cookbook?
As we've discussed previously, there's nothing that precludes domestic deflation coupled with a continued USD devaluation vs. foreign currencies.
What I'm getting at is that it might happen even though it makes no sense from a fundamental perspective.
In other words, bubbles cut both ways and at the endgame may be that the most rational market participants that have always formed the market's foundation may finally cave under the weight of self doubt.
Maybe the dollar really is worthless. Maybe oil really should cost $200/bbl.
Nothing else has made any sense.
The world is broken and it's not going to get fixed. Time to stop fighting and let it go.
lawyerliz writes:
Lawyerliz drools with admiration.
I'm not sure if I'm embarrassed or flattered, but thanks- most people in the biz treat us like what the dog did while they were at work.
Dry,
There's one bright light in US manufacturing out there.
DiNotte Lighting :: Ultimate Road Bicycle Lights
He's a friend of a friend. He's started a couple of other businesses from a small idea. Working out a small shop near home sounds better than my 6AM flight tomorrow.
The world is broken and it's not going to get fixed.
Well, at least not for quite a while, and especially not until TPTB come clean and own up to the problems. Don't hold your breath.
My Dad used to say that once in every generation farmers had a chance to make money. Right now ethanol is handing that chance to them in the upper Midwest.
wally | 04.06.08 - 7:00 pm | #
Your dad was right - except it isn't the commodity prices NOW that were that make the 'right time' it was buying land in the mid-1980s when good Midwest farm land was going for $400-$800 an acre... THAT was the one time in 'our generation' where farmers could lock in a cost structure where it would be possible to make money almost every year going forward...
At those land prices you can make money at $2 corn just about every year. At today's commodity prices $400-800/acre land almost prints money.
BTW - those 'depressed' land prices stayed that way for quite a few years. It was right after the farm crisis and you couldn't give land away. Anyone half awake could have bought the land then.
And 'ya' I looked but was as asleep as everyone else.
Lessons there for all of us.
Your dad was right - except it isn't the commodity prices NOW that were that make the 'right time' it was buying land in the mid-1980s when good Midwest farm land was going for $400-$800 an acre... THAT was the one time in 'our generation' where farmers could lock in a cost structure where it would be possible to make money almost every year going forward...
I'm fond of telling people that when the time to buy real estate is right, you'll know it because you won't have any money to buy real estate.
OT:
Chairman Ben S. Bernanke
At the Cato Institute 25th Annual Monetary Conference, Washington, D.C.
November 14, 2007
Federal Reserve Communications
FRB: Speech--Bernanke, Federal Reserve Communications--November 14, 2007
Each of the participants in the FOMC meeting--including the Federal Reserve Board members and all the Reserve Bank presidents--will, as in the past, provide projections for the growth of real gross domestic product (GDP), the unemployment rate, and core inflation (that is, inflation excluding the prices of food and energy items). In addition, participants will now provide their projections for overall inflation. Both overall and core inflation will continue to be based on the price index for personal consumption expenditures (PCE).5
5: Participants will no longer provide projections for the growth of nominal GDP. These now seem relatively less useful to the public, given participants' projections for real GDP growth and overall inflation.
See also: "birth death" model to "estimate" job creation; BLS admits it is faulty in transition periods.
Also see; Wages adjusted for inflation.
To wit: The increase in real GDP in the fourth quarter primarily reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), exports, nonresidential structures, state and local government spending, and equipment and software that were largely offset by negative contributions from private inventory investment and residential fixed investment. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, decreased.
The deceleration in real GDP growth in the fourth quarter primarily reflected a downturn in inventory investment and decelerations in exports, in federal government spending, and in PCE that were partly offset by a downturn in imports.
**
The City of New York
Monthly Report
on
Current Economic
Conditions
March 4, 2008
Highlights
http://www.nyc.gov/html/omb/pdf/ec02_08.pdf
Inflation: In January the core PCE index rose 2.5 percent y/y, well above the Feds
target rate of one to two percent. Inflation in the New York Area continues to trail the
nation.The January headline and core inflation rates were 3.7 and 2.1 percent.
Baron--never met an underwriter who wasn't super smart. They don't like you because you have to say no sometimes. And with super knowledge of real estate law.
Yes, the hub did use nitrogen tri. And it worked. While he and his buddy rolled around hidden behind a bush, laughing hysterically, they send for a welder and unwelded it.
He also has a story of pouring small bits of it out and watching the tiny explosions as it dried.
He blew up his dad's alarm clock, which made his dad mad. I don't know if he ever told his parents until their dying day about the street car.
Someone up-post mentioned the rise of social (computer) networking, and that's what I've heard also - this generation is finding, making, and maintaining friends online.
Yah, spending all your free time in front of a computer screen, how weird is that? As I surf the internet for hours and hours I wonder about the idea of "virtual friends". Don't those teenagers have anything better to do? Isn't that crazy? I don't mean you guys, you guys are all cool, I mean those other people.
You know this town really sounds like a JG Ballard book....oh, wait
Running Wild (novella) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"All of our lighting systems are built in our Hampton, N.H., facility..."
Using parts made in Asia and Mexico.
Check it out with your friend and tell me if I'm right or wrong.
I like my virtual friends here and on the Irvine Housing Blog. They are super smart and interested in the same thing I am.
It's better than when I was hooked on the game "Civilization".
I actually use some of the stuff I learn here and on IHB to advise clients.
but shouldn't teenage girls be hanging out together and painting their toenails 10 different colors?
I'm fond of telling people that when the time to buy real estate is right, you'll know it because you won't have any money to buy real estate. - ac
LOL. That was how it was with farm land back then. Back in mid-late 1980s corn was selling for UNDER a dollar at the rural elevators. The gov't would send a subsidy check almost equal to that called a 'deficiency payment' to raise the effective subsidized price to about $2/bu. In effect farmers back then were getting HALF their revenue and as a result almost ALL their profit from Washington.
You had to be might visionary to foresee a time where that would reverse... plus have the resources to stick it out. I almost jumped in but bailed out at the last minute... had cash to buy the land but didn't have enough to support me for long after that. I have mixed emotions about not doing it... I would be 'rich' now... if I didn't go broke then. About 50:50 odds either way... with wife & three kids I really wasn't in the mood to gamble.
Using parts made in Asia and Mexico.
Check it out with your friend and tell me if I'm right or wrong.
rich | 04.06.08 - 7:47 pm | #
Might be - but I doubt it. The reverse is MORE likely to be true - do the assembly in Mexico or Asia if at all. If they aren't doing the assembly offshore there is little reason to do the parts there.
I run into small mfgrs like the one lama pointed to all over - most do NOT offshore, labor cost saving not worth the hassle.
However once the owner cashes out by selling the company to a huge MNC who has people already on the ground in China & existing contacts THEN they offshore big time... ramp up production & quit selling via independent 'boutique outlet channels' and instead starts calling on the buyers in Bentonville AR. The death spiral isn't far behind...
When was the last sustained period of declining housing prices? My guess is that it was in the early 1930s. Anyone who bought a house after about 1933 has come out ahead barring contingencies. Is it any surprise that "get a house" became a piece of economic and cultural dogma?
Of course, not everyone could get a house. If you lacked the income, you could drive until you qualified, but otherwise you were renting. The game changed in the 2000s with:
So, we have a financial sure thing combined with the means and motivation to let just about anyone join the fun. The result was completely predictable.
Right now, it appears that commodities are on a tear. If we eliminate all those nasty rules about commodities trading, and make it easier for naive traders to leverage themselves, perhaps with an opt-out payroll deduction pla, we could get a brief period of amazing returns on corn speculation, followed by an impressive collapse.
Places like Maricopa are not all that much different from Levittown and the other potato farm developments of the 1950s. Culturally, they were hells of uniformity, repression and boredom back then, and they are today. How many baby boomers ran away from the conformity of the suburbs to the conformity of the city?
The difference was that the economic basis underlying Levittown was buoyed by the growing regional economy. The town is still there, though I gather there are few unmodified Levittown originals left. Maricopa was built on the margin of a development boom that has collapsed. The Levittowners had jobs that qualified them for their mortgages. The Maricopans didn't but the mortgage system let them lie about it. It wasn't the first time, and it won't be the last. Granted, it may take another 70 years.
On the plus side, my mother told me that of the neat things about the Great Depression in the 1930s was that she and her friends could always borrow a key to one of the vacant apartments in their building whenever they wanted a club house to play in. Now, those were the golden days.
Maricopa was built on the margin of a development boom that has collapsed.
Funny, that's exactly how I feel about the Obama campaign. I don't care about any of the candidates really -- America's coming political situation is not "contained" by these three schmucks any more than the economic meltdown is being "contained" by the central banks -- but Obama's candidacy in particular seems to rest upon a set of slightly stale assumptions, a sort of giddy feeling of sky's-the-limit well-being, that seems part and parcel of a "boom" zeitgeist... except the boom is in reality over.
It's the sort of zeitgeist that promises great but vague things, a sort of iCandidacy that is going to change the world forever just because it is so very very kewl.
The Obama phenomenon reminds me a lot of condos and malls that they keep inexplicably building in certain areas these days, even though it's clear they're never going to be occupied.
That "taco moderne" style for strip malls is also over-used around the vegas burbs. Ugh ugh ugly. You can drive for miles over parking lot speed bumps every 50 ft. alt.tarmac-the-world
OT: what does $1.7 million (the new average Manhattan apartment cost) buy you? barely more than 1 bedroom and 1500 sq ft:
Curbed NY: Weekend Open House Tour: The Average Tribeca Apartment
Clearly nyc still hasn't got the asset deflation memo yet.
I think Karl Denninger is losing it.
I think so too. The other day he wrote an 'open letter' to the President. I wonder how that reading went.
So Mal, what's the alternative? McBush?!? Ralph the kook? Don't get me wrong, Barak is a flawed soul, and has many stances that drive me batty (He's OK with the Airbus contract is just the latest), but troops in Iraq for 100 years? Or how about Phil Gramm back in power (Or-shudder-Wendy Gramm)? Look, I've had enough, I'm literally turning into a "yellow dog" right about now.
Rich,
Dry is right. You have it backwards. Take a GoreTex jacket for example. Almost every one of them is "Made in China". Well, the GoreTex is produced in AZ. The rest of the fabric likely is US made as well. However, making a garment with GoreTex is manually intensive, so it's sewn together in China. Hence the tag.
Without asking I know that lighting is all made here. Cheap LED lights might be made in China, not those.
One more thing, you would never make a quality specialty item in China. I have a business acquaintance who lived in China for 2 years. His job? Just watching them to make sure they didn't cut corners. He told me they would use cheaper resins in extruded plastics; whatever; no matter how small the cost savings, just to save a couple of bucks. They didn't appear to care about ruining a business relationship. Not someone you'd have making a specialty product with your name on it.
No wonder Ive been deranged all these years, my parents didnt go sufficiently in debt for me. That extra bedroom MIGHT have mattered, but NO... THEY had to save.
Wait, I hear the voice again. Something about the guns... Gotta go.
High schools lower property values?
I live in NYC, half a block south of Stuyvesant HS. Glenwood, Related, Rockrose et al didn't seem to have a problem with building in the neighborhood - and well they shouldn't. I'm grateful to pay rents that make my nose bleed - because the only dwellings that can be bought here start at $1100/foot.
No wonder those s**t for brains developers out in Arizona are losing money.
Tanta:
Our house was a 1950 Levitt, which consisted of a kitchen, living room (with the TV build into the stair case provided by Levitt) and two bedrooms. The attic was unfinished and instead of a garage, there was a carport.
Very typical. When my sister was born in 1961, my father re-financed (if that's what it was called in 1961) and torn off the roof and build a dormer with one large bedroom for me and my bother. The unfinished portion of the attic was not completed for several years.
At that time my father was a CPA working in New York, my mother was a R.N., but did not go back to work until my sister was in elementary school.
OK, I'll get to my point.
Just like you our summers were spent playing, bicycling and swimming. Levitt in his kindness and wisdom, build community pools for the buyers of his homes and deeded these pools and their surrounding parks to the local government to be used in perpetuity by residents of the homes he had built. To obtain the tag needed to be admitted to the pool, one had to present some bill that showed where you lived, if you lived in a Levitt house, you received a pool tag.
I know that there are many difficulties when manufacturing or producing in China today. However, this whole discussion reminds me of the discussions in the 1960s and 70s regarding Japan's or later Taiwan's abilities. These aren't issues any more...
I expect that within a few years or at the very latest the next decade all of this will have been not much more than wishful thinking.
I expect that within a few years or at the very latest the next decade all of this will have been not much more than wishful thinking.
RE | 04.06.08 - 9:23 pm | #
RE - when China gets to where Taiwan & Japan are today they won't be a problem - they won't be cheap anymore.
I don't mind seeing American companies lose their ass to Toyota - Toyota builds a fine product worldwide and charges a premium... you want to compete with them you better make good stuff.
I get pretty jazzed when places like China make crap, get away with it mostly because their CB buys down the currency... its like working for nothing isn't enough... they need their gov't to make sure its less than nothing (considering the hidden losses on 'our' paper they bought to hold their currency so low).
As per lama's point about Gortex - I see that all the time... export parts to China to assemble then ship back. THAT is changing - those component plants are going into China FAST... but their costs are rising even faster.
We will be able to make stuff here again once the currencies balance out & we wake up & start making stuff again. We'll either start doing that or go without a lot of the stuff kids in Maricopa expect.
One more thing, you would never make a quality specialty item in China. I have a business acquaintance who lived in China for 2 years. His job? Just watching them to make sure they didn't cut corners.
Cracks me up, in a weird sort of way, that China now manufactures our pharmaceuticals. Does that strike anyone strange besides me?
And if anyone need a suit, Joseph Abboud still makes most/all in the US. If you don't need a suit, lucky you!
Sorry to go back on topic, but this is an interesting organization:
Smart Communities Network: Land Use Planning Key Principles
Another friend got his masters degree in Urban Planning focusing on Neo-traditional planning. He's a financial analyst.
Dryfly,
I dont think you are quite fair here. From my perspective, the Japanese have been the greatest currency manipulators for a long time under the guise of having a free floating currency.
I also think it is important to note that the U.S. encouraged countries openly to peg to the dollar when it was to its advantage. It was sold as providing stability to countries with less developed financial markets.
One cannot have it both ways and now the boomerang has returned.
Cracks me up, in a weird sort of way, that China now manufactures our pharmaceuticals. Does that strike anyone strange besides me?
Outsider | 04.06.08 - 9:52 pm | #
Making the pharmaceuticals isn't a lot different than making antifreeze or paint thinner - just a chemical process. Its the controls & monitoring & record keeping that makes it 'special'. Considering China's track record on this front it does seem a bit strange.
My middle child had borderline lead levels at 1 y.o. I have no idea from where, but suspect the cheap plastic toys from China.
I think long and hard before I decide to take any pill.
I dont think you are quite fair here. From my perspective, the Japanese have been the greatest currency manipulators for a long time under the guise of having a free floating currency.
I agree the Japanese still manipulate a lot but it was AFTER Plaza... if China gives us a Plaza then I might cut them some slack afterward to maintain stability. If they gave us Plaza I think RMB:USD would be something like 4:1. That was the sort of cut Plaza was. China's inflation rate problem would go away at those ratios pretty fast. Might even see deflation over there if they cut as much as Plaza as fast as Plaza - that might be too much too fast.
Give 'em credit - the Chinese learned from Plaza to move slow. Damned slow...
As far as the US asking for a peg - that was (1) quite a while ago (2) in conjunction w/ fallout from the 'Asian Contagion' circa 1997 where everyone benefited from stability... and (3)long past the time where it benefited anyone.
March 25, 1975. That's the DAY that innocence died when I was growing up. The Lyon sisters disappeared on their way home from Wheaton Plaza and were never heard from again. As with 9/11 we DO have to balance our fears however.
Dryfly,
The U.S. was encouraging dollar pegs in South America as recently as 1999. Very recently!
Will the greenback reign?
"... Speaking earlier this month to a joint congressional subcommittee on economic policy and international trade and finance, U.S. Republican Senator and Chairman of the Joint Economic Committee Connie Mack said that allowing Latin American countries to adopt the U.S. dollar as their official currency would help stabilize prices and raise U.S. living standards.
Other members of the committee also chimed in, praising the idea of different central governments abandoning their national currencies for the U.S. greenback.
Removing 'daunting' obstacles
Not only will adaptation of the dollar help benefit those countries whose currencies blow in whatever direction financial markets want them to, it will also help the U.S. by lowering business transaction costs and providing financial and political stability.
"Dollarization would remove one of the most daunting obstacles for the development of Latin American economies - their protracted instability and propensity to exchange-rate fluctuations," Manuel Hinds, a former minister of finance for El Salvador, testified to the subcommittee. ..."</i>
The U.S. was encouraging dollar pegs in South America as recently as 1999. Very recently!
That was almost a decade ago... the result of Rubin's work... a lot has happened in a decade, since Rubin was king. Dotbomb, 9/11, two wars, housing bubble and now the credit crunch. Holding a peg through all that? How do they think they can make it stick? Crazy to for us & them to even think it is possible let alone the smart thing to do.
Damn, I missed a good posting chance.
Spent the day in church messing with kids, at soccer game for one kid while other kid played with smaller ones there and the third was doing "boy stuff" around the neighborhood with two buddies. Other parents were home and gave him my cell phone number in case he needed me - but stay out of the house.
I kinda want my kids to mess in treehouses and rummage through field and wood. As much as they require constant weeding - weeds being a lot of the crap that our society puts out there - they need to learn how to recover from their scraped knees on their own.
But I still have to take a deep breath.
Crazy to for us & them to even think it is possible let alone the smart thing to do.
No I dont think they can. This is actually one of my biggest worries that it will come apart too quickly and trash the dollar with the world financial system in its wake.
I believe that the Chinese are still quite convinced that they made it through the Asian financial crisis so successfully because of their peg. I also believe that they feel, especially in light of the present instability, they need to hold onto the peg as tightly as they can in order to retain their hard fought stability. I believe they are fighting the last war but given Japans experience with Plaza and what happened to their neighbors in the late nineties, I fully understand.
Decisions to peg or not cannot be made that quickly especially in a country with limited experience with free markets and a highly vulnerable financial system. Nine years in that context is a short time. As we just found out, even so-called stable financial systems in highly developed countries can devolve quickly into extreme instability. Financially immature countries are even more susceptible to such events. This is why I cannot blame China for the peg especially not in light of the fact that they have allowed for continued appreciation in recent years.
However, given the statements by U.S. officials in Setsers blog, even the U.S. doesnt appear to want a depeg at this time by anybody of even small significance.
IMO this makes for even less stability in an already unstable world as it forces other economies into a worsening inflationary spiral at a time when their better judgment had finally told them otherwise. However, it also points out how unstable the system has become because of the U.S. CAD which I think should not be termed a savings glut but a consumption addiction.
I am now worried that we will see a forced depeg by a major player because of inflationary pressures when the mob is in the street and unfortunately not as a result of a new Plaza.
I believe they are fighting the last war but given Japans experience with Plaza and what happened to their neighbors in the late nineties, I fully understand.
I fully agree - Plaza was a mess exactly because so much water built up behind the dam. China - whether they think so or not - is repeating the same mistake, letting an awful lot of water build up behind the dam. If you are right that the mob forces the depegging it will one helluva flood.
CAD which I think should not be termed a savings glut but a consumption addiction.
Semantics - they are coupled like the ying-yang diagram - inseparable. You won't see one go away without the other - we stop spending & they have to stop saving & vice versa.
However, given the statements by U.S. officials in Setsers blog, even the U.S. doesnt appear to want a depeg at this time by anybody of even small significance.
Ya - I know. Our team fears deflation and if the Chinese stop sending us 'money supply' where else can it come from? I don't see the Chinese stopping their manipulation of the yuan - but I would not be surprised if they unpegged. Allow for a de facto Plaza solution. Slower than Plaza but faster than the yuan appreciation has been up until now.
BTW - I compete with Chinese mfgrs... they are nowhere near as competitive as they were just a year ago... rebalancing is well on its way whether we really want it or not. I don't see any going back either.
Dryfly,
Thanks for your comments. I really enjoyed the discussion.