I noticed Hugh has asked that we slow down on the Frank-Dodd housing bill. I got a press release from Rep. Michele Bachmann stating the bill is "deeply flawed".

"The bill even includes a $35 million dollar slush fund for trial lawyers. And according to the Congressional Budget Office, the bill would help refinance the loans of only 500,000 people � less than 1% of homeowners � at the expense of the 51 million homeowners who pay their loans on time, however much they may be hard-pressed to do so.

"The bill is so broad that homeowners covered could deliberately default on their loans to cash-in on the taxpayer bail-out. In others words, a taxpaying single mother working extra hours to pay her mortgage on time could be asked to help pay the loans of someone who intentionally defaulted.

"Lenders and servicers can game the system as well. The bill invites them to cherry-pick only their worst loans to dump onto American taxpayers � including loans people secured through outright fraud.

Hugh's request that we need more time to look at it would be met by the CBO report on the bill that Rep. Bachmann mentions. They estimate the subsidy at $1.7 billion, or $3400 per household refinanced. That on top of the Heritage report on the bill should be enough to convince most that it's a bad idea.

Unfortunately it passed, and thus gives the banks yet another fillip in return for bad decisionmaking. And, as Dean Baker points out, it is just delaying the needed price adjustment in housing.

For those Minnesota congresspeople who voted for the bill (read, all the Ds plus Rep. Ramstad), ask this: Do you think this money should be used to bail out the Parish Homes development? Are you sure it wouldn't be?

Labels: economics, housing